All The Devil's Creatures: A Jack McDermott Serial Killer Thriller, page 10
Somebody hurt him. Somebody made him feel insignificant…somebody humiliated him. Was it you?
And then suddenly it all clicked.
“…oh shit…” Jack whispered.
“What?”
“…I know who it is.”
22
“Who?” Li demanded.
“A guy by the name of Elias Johansson. He was a former teaching assistant of mine.”
“How do you know?” Andrea asked.
“Well, I don’t, not for certain… but he knew Donald, he was fascinated by serial killers… and he would have a motive for coming after me.”
“What’s his motive?”
“Elias was my TA about two years ago. Donald had just started as a graduate student in the department but didn’t work for me yet, so they knew each other. Elias had a girlfriend, an undergrad named Cassie Hobbs.
“I noticed one Monday that Elias was depressed and distracted. His hand was bandaged and it looked like he hadn’t slept the entire weekend. I asked him what was wrong; he just said he was under a lot of stress. I tried to talk to him about it, but he obviously didn’t want to discuss it, so I dropped it.
“Cassie came to my office a week later. We’d met at a faculty party when Elias brought her as his date, so I knew who she was. She told me she was scared. She’d broken things off with Elias the weekend before, but he didn’t take it well. In fact, he’d become enraged and punched a hole in her wall. She threatened to call the cops and he left.
“He started texting her, but he alternated between being abusive and apologetic. She blocked his number – and then he started using other people’s phones to call her. Most were numbers she didn’t recognize, so she wouldn’t answer. He’d leave these long, rambling voicemails cursing her out and then another one a few minutes later apologizing and begging her to take him back.
“Then he started stalking her. She’d catch glimpses of a guy in a black hoodie following her everywhere. She was afraid he might try to break into her apartment while she was sleeping, so she was staying with a friend.
“She asked me if I would have a talk with him and tell him to stop it. I told her I would, but I also advised her to contact the police about his behavior. She said she already had, and they’d said she could file a restraining order, but until he actually did something besides call her, their hands were tied.
“I sat Elias down in my office and told him that Cassie had come and talked to me, but before I could say anything else, he just lost it. He accused me of seducing her and then he physically attacked me. I eventually threw him on the ground, pinned him down, and yelled until some random student from the hallway came in and I told her to get security.
“Campus security came and restrained Elias until the cops got there. I tried to talk to him and tell him he needed to get counseling, but he just flipped out even more – he started screaming about how I was sleeping with a student and that I should be fired. My number one priority was to keep him away from Cassie, so I pressed charges for the assault.
“Cassie and I both went before the judge at the bail hearing and explained why we thought he was a threat and should be kept in jail till the trial. Elias started screaming at the top of his lungs, saying we were sleeping together and that the judge was in on it now – that I was bribing him so I could have Cassie all to myself.
“He wouldn’t stop screaming – even his court-appointed lawyer couldn’t get him to shut up – so the judge had a bailiff remove him. The cops testified that Cassie had called them about the stalking, too. Add it all up and the judge raised Elias’s bail to a point where he couldn’t afford the 15% for the bond bailsman. They put him in a psychiatric ward for evaluation, then he was eventually put in jail until the trial. In the meantime, I fired him and the university expelled him for the assault.
“He got probation at trial, but he violated the restraining order Cassie had and spent another three months in jail. Last I heard, he went back home to live with his mother.”
“Where’s that?”
“I don’t know exactly, but I know it’s somewhere in Georgia.”
Li pointed to Martinez. “Look him up. If he’s on probation, then we should have his current residence.”
“How do you spell his name?” Martinez asked as she sat down at a desk.
Jack spelled out ‘Elias Johansson’ for her.
While Martinez was looking, Li looked at Jack. “So he has fairly good reason – in his mind, anyway – to think you ruined his life.”
“Pretty much,” Jack admitted. “But if it really is him, why all this other stuff? Why the girl in Athens? Why kill Donald?”
“Easy,” Li said. “The girl in Athens was because he’s taking out all his rage on a college girl who’s a stand-in for his ex. Maybe he went after Donald because Donald has the life he feels was taken away from him. If he thought you and Cassie were stabbing him in the back, and the judge was in on it, it’s not too big a stretch to think Donald screwed him over, too.”
“But why go all the way to Athens to kill Meredith Housel?”
“Maybe he lives in Athens.”
“Nope,” Martinez announced from her computer screen. “Adairsville, Georgia, about an hour and a half northwest of here. Lives with his mother, Irene Johansson. Nothing here about the father.”
“He died when Elias was young,” Jack said. “I don’t think his mother ever remarried.”
“Okay,” Li said, changing theories on the fly, “he went to Athens because it’s another big college far away from Georgia State. He didn’t want to go back to the scene of the crime, as it were.”
“But then he killed Donald, who was at Georgia State.”
“Yeah,” Li said sardonically, “‘cause Donald was there.”
“But if he wants to get revenge, why not just walk up to me in the street and shoot me in the back of the head?”
“Maybe he wants you to suffer the way you made him suffer.” Li put up one hand. “I’m just saying what’s in his mind, by the way – I’m not saying I agree with him.”
“But – ”
“Look, you can set these up all day and I’ll keep knockin’ ‘em down. This guy is our absolute best lead at the moment – I mean, he’s definitely got motive. Why do you keep trying to get him off the hook?”
“Because it doesn’t make much sense now that I actually think about it.”
“Screaming at the judge at his bail hearing? Violating a restraining order on probation? Doesn’t sound like this guy has much sense.”
“Which doesn’t fit with the killer’s M.O. at all,” Andrea pointed out.
“What do you mean?” Li asked.
“The killer is cool, calm, and collected. He’s utterly in control. That doesn’t match anything Jack’s told us about Elias Johansson.”
“Well, he’s had two years to cool his jets. Maybe he learned to control it.”
“That’s not really how it works,” Jack said. “You know the saying about ‘The way you do the small things is the way you do everything’? There aren’t any serial killers who start out chaotic and erratic and turn into cold-blooded masterminds. And why reveal he’s the killer?”
“He didn’t,” Li objected.
“Come on, it’s like he’s counting on me figuring it out. That video, the pages from my book – he wanted me to make the connection. Plus… I don’t know, the guy I talked to on the phone didn’t sound anything like Elias.”
“You said he was using some kind of voice-changing device.”
“That’s not what I mean – I’m talking about tonality, cadence… how he sounds. Elias was always quiet and lacking in confidence. The killer is flamboyant, a showman, super-confident bordering on arrogance.”
Li threw up his hands in frustration. “Our one real lead and you want to toss it out the window because he doesn’t sound the same?”
“Or act the same, or do anything the same,” Andrea said.
Li glared at her. “You got any other suspects you’re hiding up your sleeve?”
“…no,” Andrea admitted.
“How ‘bout you?” Li asked Jack. “Any other bright ideas?”
“Not at the moment, no.”
“Then this guy’s our best bet. Let’s go talk to Mr. Johansson and see what his deal is.”
23
Jack sat in the passenger seat of Andrea’s car as she drove north on I-75 to Adairsville. They were following Li and Martinez in Li’s Nissan Maxima.
“You seem a bit troubled,” Andrea said.
“None of this makes any sense,” Jack responded.
“I agree on general principle, but Li’s right – Johansson is our best bet at the moment. We have to talk to him.”
“Yeah, but aren’t you just the tiniest bit concerned that we’re playing right into what the killer wants? He murders Meredith Housel to leave a clue to draw me into the investigation… then he kills Donald to make sure I’m in all the way… and now he’s leading us around by the nose to go talk to Elias. He’s choreographed this every step of the way. Doesn’t that bother you?”
“Yes, but what other choice do we have? Ignore it and sit around twiddling our thumbs?”
“No, but…”
Jack trailed off.
“‘No, but’ what?” Andrea asked.
“I don’t know. I don’t like following the breadcrumb trail this guy has laid out.”
“Sooner or later he’ll slip up.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know he’s supremely confident in himself, that much is for sure – and the more he puts himself out there, the greater the chance is that he finally makes a mistake. What’s the saying? ‘There’s the things you know, the things you know you don’t know, and the things you don’t know you don’t know.’”
“What’s Donald Rumsfeld got to do with this?”
“The killer’s smart, right? He knows enough not to leave behind prints or DNA or trace evidence. So far he’s avoided security cameras. But if he keeps putting himself in inherently risky situations, eventually he’s going to do something he doesn’t realize he shouldn’t do. Something he doesn’t know he doesn’t know. And when he does, that’ll lead us right to him.”
“You sound awfully confident about that,” Jack said.
“As long as they keep going, they all mess up sooner or later.”
“Not all of them. The Babysitter Killer didn’t… the Alphabet Killer…”
Andrea glanced over at him. “When I took your statement last night, you said those were the serial killers he mentioned to you over the phone.”
“…yeah…”
“Jack, you can’t let this guy inside your head.”
“Too late.”
Andrea’s voice became gentle. “I am so sorry about Donald. I can’t say I know exactly what it feels like, but I have an idea. Because of my sister.”
Jack remembered the story about how her sister had disappeared.
He hated that she was having to dredge up those memories to comfort him. “Andrea…”
“All I’m saying is this guy isn’t Lex Luthor or… I don’t know, whatever evil geniuses there are in a comic book. He’s human. And humans make mistakes.”
Jack exhaled. “You’re right. Sorry.”
“For what?”
“For throwing myself a pity parade.”
“Given everything you’ve been through over the last 24 hours, I’d say you’re allowed a pity parade.” She smiled. “A short one.”
“You know, you’re very different than you were when you walked into my classroom yesterday.”
“Well, I’ve gotten to know you better since then. And… I was kind of a jerk when I first talked to you.”
“‘Kind of’?” he teased.
“HEY,” she said humorously.
He laughed. “Just yanking your chain.”
“Yeah, well, you can quit yanking it now.”
He put his hands up. “All done.”
“Good.” She paused for a second… then said, “It meant a lot to me when you came outside to check on me at the morgue.”
The vulnerability in her voice moved him. “Anybody would have done it.”
“No, they wouldn’t have. Not the men or even most of the women I work with. So that alone made me look at you differently.”
He started teasing her again. “Why, how did you see me before?”
“We’re having another nice moment,” she said lightly. “Let’s not ruin it again.”
He knew she was talking about the car ride from Athens to Atlanta, and how they had started to open up to one another before he’d told Morse he wouldn’t get involved in the case.
All it took was for Donald to get murdered, he thought guiltily.
But he didn’t show his feelings when he replied.
“Okay,” he said simply.
“Since we’ve got over an hour till we get to Adairsville, let’s just look at the possibility that Johansson is the killer.”
“I thought you agreed with me that he isn’t.”
“Based on what you’ve said about him, I do – but I could be wrong.”
“Nooooo,” Jack said playfully, like he was shocked at the possibility.
She gave him a warning look.
“Alright, alright,” he said with a chuckle.
“Besides, maybe by going back over it, you can come up with a reason you think the killer is leading us to Johansson,” Andrea suggested.
Jack thought for a moment before speaking.
“For the killer, this is a game. It’s a way to prove he’s smarter than I am. Elias would have come after me directly, not kill some random girl in Athens. And truthfully, I just can’t see him as a killer. It’s a big jump from heartbroken stalker to murderer.”
“Heartbroken?” Andrea said dubiously.
“Despite all of the horrible ways he expressed it, Elias still acted out of grief. He was genuinely in love with Cassie, whatever ‘love’ might have meant to him. At the root of it all, I think he was subconsciously trying to get ‘Mommy’ to love him and make him feel like he was worth something. It probably had a lot to do with him feeling safe, too.”
“Safe? He was the one stalking her.”
“Yes, but… okay, if he subconsciously identified his romantic partner with his mother – which isn’t uncommon, a lot of men do it – ”
“I’ve noticed,” Andrea said drily.
“Well, your parents are your primary source of safety growing up. Since Elias is a male, let’s stick with boys and their mothers. A boy with a mother who has a bad temper, or who’s physically or emotionally abusive… or whose love is conditional on how he acts… all these things make a child feel extremely unsafe. And as children, we tend to associate that lack of safety with a fear of death.”
Andrea frowned. “Isn’t that a bit extreme?”
“A kid would never use those words, exactly – but didn’t you ever say when you were little, ‘My parents are going to kill me’?”
“Sure, but – ”
“But you didn’t literally mean your parents were going to murder you.”
“Of course not.”
“Of course not… consciously. On a subconscious level, though, you probably were afraid that the person who was bigger than you, stronger than you, and who was about to get VERY ANGRY at you might actually kill you.
“As we grow up, our rational minds tell us that would’ve never happened. But the childlike belief never truly goes away. Those beliefs play out on a subconscious level as adults, especially with the romantic partners we seek.”
Andrea tried to connect the dots. “So when Cassie broke things off with him, Elias was symbolically losing his mother’s love… and that made him feel unsafe… maybe even like he might die.”
“And people who feel worthless and afraid do some incredibly messed-up things,” Jack said. “To Elias, Cassie was love, self-worth, safety – and when all that was taken away, he flipped out.”
“Where’d you get all of this?”
“Just about every pop-culture self-help book out there,” Jack said with a smile.
“Okay, but let’s say the whole ‘mother angle’ is correct. If he thought you slept with Cassie – by the way, you didn’t sleep with her, did you?”
“No!” Jack said, offended.
“Sorry, I had to ask. But no matter what, he still thought you slept with her. What if he was so enraged by what he thought you did that it drove him over the edge? He hated you so much, and felt so inferior, that he had to prove himself to be superior to you?”
“There are some holes in that theory.”
“So fill them in,” Andrea said with slight exasperation.
“You know what a sociopath is, right?”
“Someone who doesn’t feel guilt or remorse. They’re drawn to power over other people and are pathological liars and master manipulators.”
“Those are some of the biggest characteristics, yes. Sociopaths have a problem empathizing with others and tend to see people as ‘things’ rather than human beings. And though some of them are glibly charming because they learn to manipulate people to get what they want, they tend to have ‘shallowness of affect’ – or very shallow emotions. No deep feelings of love or joy.
“Incidentally, psychology doesn’t use the term ‘sociopath’ anymore. It kind of fell out of use because it was originally coined almost a hundred years ago as part of a theory about people being a blank slate when they were born, which has long since been discredited. But it’s still in popular use.”
“What’s the difference between a sociopath and a psychopath?” Andrea asked.
“Depends on who you ask. ‘Psychopath’ is still a term that’s used clinically, but words go in and out of vogue. After Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho came out back in 1960, ‘psycho’ became slang for anybody with mental health issues, and the establishment stopped using ‘psychopath’ as much.”
He almost made a joke about ‘leaning on pop culture references’ – something she’d accused him of yesterday – then decided things were going well and she might not think the jab was funny, so he just continued.
“Some people say sociopaths are more prone to violence, and others say psychopaths are. Some say sociopaths are made by abusive upbringings, and psychopaths are born. But for all intents and purposes, sociopaths and psychopaths are the same thing.
And then suddenly it all clicked.
“…oh shit…” Jack whispered.
“What?”
“…I know who it is.”
22
“Who?” Li demanded.
“A guy by the name of Elias Johansson. He was a former teaching assistant of mine.”
“How do you know?” Andrea asked.
“Well, I don’t, not for certain… but he knew Donald, he was fascinated by serial killers… and he would have a motive for coming after me.”
“What’s his motive?”
“Elias was my TA about two years ago. Donald had just started as a graduate student in the department but didn’t work for me yet, so they knew each other. Elias had a girlfriend, an undergrad named Cassie Hobbs.
“I noticed one Monday that Elias was depressed and distracted. His hand was bandaged and it looked like he hadn’t slept the entire weekend. I asked him what was wrong; he just said he was under a lot of stress. I tried to talk to him about it, but he obviously didn’t want to discuss it, so I dropped it.
“Cassie came to my office a week later. We’d met at a faculty party when Elias brought her as his date, so I knew who she was. She told me she was scared. She’d broken things off with Elias the weekend before, but he didn’t take it well. In fact, he’d become enraged and punched a hole in her wall. She threatened to call the cops and he left.
“He started texting her, but he alternated between being abusive and apologetic. She blocked his number – and then he started using other people’s phones to call her. Most were numbers she didn’t recognize, so she wouldn’t answer. He’d leave these long, rambling voicemails cursing her out and then another one a few minutes later apologizing and begging her to take him back.
“Then he started stalking her. She’d catch glimpses of a guy in a black hoodie following her everywhere. She was afraid he might try to break into her apartment while she was sleeping, so she was staying with a friend.
“She asked me if I would have a talk with him and tell him to stop it. I told her I would, but I also advised her to contact the police about his behavior. She said she already had, and they’d said she could file a restraining order, but until he actually did something besides call her, their hands were tied.
“I sat Elias down in my office and told him that Cassie had come and talked to me, but before I could say anything else, he just lost it. He accused me of seducing her and then he physically attacked me. I eventually threw him on the ground, pinned him down, and yelled until some random student from the hallway came in and I told her to get security.
“Campus security came and restrained Elias until the cops got there. I tried to talk to him and tell him he needed to get counseling, but he just flipped out even more – he started screaming about how I was sleeping with a student and that I should be fired. My number one priority was to keep him away from Cassie, so I pressed charges for the assault.
“Cassie and I both went before the judge at the bail hearing and explained why we thought he was a threat and should be kept in jail till the trial. Elias started screaming at the top of his lungs, saying we were sleeping together and that the judge was in on it now – that I was bribing him so I could have Cassie all to myself.
“He wouldn’t stop screaming – even his court-appointed lawyer couldn’t get him to shut up – so the judge had a bailiff remove him. The cops testified that Cassie had called them about the stalking, too. Add it all up and the judge raised Elias’s bail to a point where he couldn’t afford the 15% for the bond bailsman. They put him in a psychiatric ward for evaluation, then he was eventually put in jail until the trial. In the meantime, I fired him and the university expelled him for the assault.
“He got probation at trial, but he violated the restraining order Cassie had and spent another three months in jail. Last I heard, he went back home to live with his mother.”
“Where’s that?”
“I don’t know exactly, but I know it’s somewhere in Georgia.”
Li pointed to Martinez. “Look him up. If he’s on probation, then we should have his current residence.”
“How do you spell his name?” Martinez asked as she sat down at a desk.
Jack spelled out ‘Elias Johansson’ for her.
While Martinez was looking, Li looked at Jack. “So he has fairly good reason – in his mind, anyway – to think you ruined his life.”
“Pretty much,” Jack admitted. “But if it really is him, why all this other stuff? Why the girl in Athens? Why kill Donald?”
“Easy,” Li said. “The girl in Athens was because he’s taking out all his rage on a college girl who’s a stand-in for his ex. Maybe he went after Donald because Donald has the life he feels was taken away from him. If he thought you and Cassie were stabbing him in the back, and the judge was in on it, it’s not too big a stretch to think Donald screwed him over, too.”
“But why go all the way to Athens to kill Meredith Housel?”
“Maybe he lives in Athens.”
“Nope,” Martinez announced from her computer screen. “Adairsville, Georgia, about an hour and a half northwest of here. Lives with his mother, Irene Johansson. Nothing here about the father.”
“He died when Elias was young,” Jack said. “I don’t think his mother ever remarried.”
“Okay,” Li said, changing theories on the fly, “he went to Athens because it’s another big college far away from Georgia State. He didn’t want to go back to the scene of the crime, as it were.”
“But then he killed Donald, who was at Georgia State.”
“Yeah,” Li said sardonically, “‘cause Donald was there.”
“But if he wants to get revenge, why not just walk up to me in the street and shoot me in the back of the head?”
“Maybe he wants you to suffer the way you made him suffer.” Li put up one hand. “I’m just saying what’s in his mind, by the way – I’m not saying I agree with him.”
“But – ”
“Look, you can set these up all day and I’ll keep knockin’ ‘em down. This guy is our absolute best lead at the moment – I mean, he’s definitely got motive. Why do you keep trying to get him off the hook?”
“Because it doesn’t make much sense now that I actually think about it.”
“Screaming at the judge at his bail hearing? Violating a restraining order on probation? Doesn’t sound like this guy has much sense.”
“Which doesn’t fit with the killer’s M.O. at all,” Andrea pointed out.
“What do you mean?” Li asked.
“The killer is cool, calm, and collected. He’s utterly in control. That doesn’t match anything Jack’s told us about Elias Johansson.”
“Well, he’s had two years to cool his jets. Maybe he learned to control it.”
“That’s not really how it works,” Jack said. “You know the saying about ‘The way you do the small things is the way you do everything’? There aren’t any serial killers who start out chaotic and erratic and turn into cold-blooded masterminds. And why reveal he’s the killer?”
“He didn’t,” Li objected.
“Come on, it’s like he’s counting on me figuring it out. That video, the pages from my book – he wanted me to make the connection. Plus… I don’t know, the guy I talked to on the phone didn’t sound anything like Elias.”
“You said he was using some kind of voice-changing device.”
“That’s not what I mean – I’m talking about tonality, cadence… how he sounds. Elias was always quiet and lacking in confidence. The killer is flamboyant, a showman, super-confident bordering on arrogance.”
Li threw up his hands in frustration. “Our one real lead and you want to toss it out the window because he doesn’t sound the same?”
“Or act the same, or do anything the same,” Andrea said.
Li glared at her. “You got any other suspects you’re hiding up your sleeve?”
“…no,” Andrea admitted.
“How ‘bout you?” Li asked Jack. “Any other bright ideas?”
“Not at the moment, no.”
“Then this guy’s our best bet. Let’s go talk to Mr. Johansson and see what his deal is.”
23
Jack sat in the passenger seat of Andrea’s car as she drove north on I-75 to Adairsville. They were following Li and Martinez in Li’s Nissan Maxima.
“You seem a bit troubled,” Andrea said.
“None of this makes any sense,” Jack responded.
“I agree on general principle, but Li’s right – Johansson is our best bet at the moment. We have to talk to him.”
“Yeah, but aren’t you just the tiniest bit concerned that we’re playing right into what the killer wants? He murders Meredith Housel to leave a clue to draw me into the investigation… then he kills Donald to make sure I’m in all the way… and now he’s leading us around by the nose to go talk to Elias. He’s choreographed this every step of the way. Doesn’t that bother you?”
“Yes, but what other choice do we have? Ignore it and sit around twiddling our thumbs?”
“No, but…”
Jack trailed off.
“‘No, but’ what?” Andrea asked.
“I don’t know. I don’t like following the breadcrumb trail this guy has laid out.”
“Sooner or later he’ll slip up.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know he’s supremely confident in himself, that much is for sure – and the more he puts himself out there, the greater the chance is that he finally makes a mistake. What’s the saying? ‘There’s the things you know, the things you know you don’t know, and the things you don’t know you don’t know.’”
“What’s Donald Rumsfeld got to do with this?”
“The killer’s smart, right? He knows enough not to leave behind prints or DNA or trace evidence. So far he’s avoided security cameras. But if he keeps putting himself in inherently risky situations, eventually he’s going to do something he doesn’t realize he shouldn’t do. Something he doesn’t know he doesn’t know. And when he does, that’ll lead us right to him.”
“You sound awfully confident about that,” Jack said.
“As long as they keep going, they all mess up sooner or later.”
“Not all of them. The Babysitter Killer didn’t… the Alphabet Killer…”
Andrea glanced over at him. “When I took your statement last night, you said those were the serial killers he mentioned to you over the phone.”
“…yeah…”
“Jack, you can’t let this guy inside your head.”
“Too late.”
Andrea’s voice became gentle. “I am so sorry about Donald. I can’t say I know exactly what it feels like, but I have an idea. Because of my sister.”
Jack remembered the story about how her sister had disappeared.
He hated that she was having to dredge up those memories to comfort him. “Andrea…”
“All I’m saying is this guy isn’t Lex Luthor or… I don’t know, whatever evil geniuses there are in a comic book. He’s human. And humans make mistakes.”
Jack exhaled. “You’re right. Sorry.”
“For what?”
“For throwing myself a pity parade.”
“Given everything you’ve been through over the last 24 hours, I’d say you’re allowed a pity parade.” She smiled. “A short one.”
“You know, you’re very different than you were when you walked into my classroom yesterday.”
“Well, I’ve gotten to know you better since then. And… I was kind of a jerk when I first talked to you.”
“‘Kind of’?” he teased.
“HEY,” she said humorously.
He laughed. “Just yanking your chain.”
“Yeah, well, you can quit yanking it now.”
He put his hands up. “All done.”
“Good.” She paused for a second… then said, “It meant a lot to me when you came outside to check on me at the morgue.”
The vulnerability in her voice moved him. “Anybody would have done it.”
“No, they wouldn’t have. Not the men or even most of the women I work with. So that alone made me look at you differently.”
He started teasing her again. “Why, how did you see me before?”
“We’re having another nice moment,” she said lightly. “Let’s not ruin it again.”
He knew she was talking about the car ride from Athens to Atlanta, and how they had started to open up to one another before he’d told Morse he wouldn’t get involved in the case.
All it took was for Donald to get murdered, he thought guiltily.
But he didn’t show his feelings when he replied.
“Okay,” he said simply.
“Since we’ve got over an hour till we get to Adairsville, let’s just look at the possibility that Johansson is the killer.”
“I thought you agreed with me that he isn’t.”
“Based on what you’ve said about him, I do – but I could be wrong.”
“Nooooo,” Jack said playfully, like he was shocked at the possibility.
She gave him a warning look.
“Alright, alright,” he said with a chuckle.
“Besides, maybe by going back over it, you can come up with a reason you think the killer is leading us to Johansson,” Andrea suggested.
Jack thought for a moment before speaking.
“For the killer, this is a game. It’s a way to prove he’s smarter than I am. Elias would have come after me directly, not kill some random girl in Athens. And truthfully, I just can’t see him as a killer. It’s a big jump from heartbroken stalker to murderer.”
“Heartbroken?” Andrea said dubiously.
“Despite all of the horrible ways he expressed it, Elias still acted out of grief. He was genuinely in love with Cassie, whatever ‘love’ might have meant to him. At the root of it all, I think he was subconsciously trying to get ‘Mommy’ to love him and make him feel like he was worth something. It probably had a lot to do with him feeling safe, too.”
“Safe? He was the one stalking her.”
“Yes, but… okay, if he subconsciously identified his romantic partner with his mother – which isn’t uncommon, a lot of men do it – ”
“I’ve noticed,” Andrea said drily.
“Well, your parents are your primary source of safety growing up. Since Elias is a male, let’s stick with boys and their mothers. A boy with a mother who has a bad temper, or who’s physically or emotionally abusive… or whose love is conditional on how he acts… all these things make a child feel extremely unsafe. And as children, we tend to associate that lack of safety with a fear of death.”
Andrea frowned. “Isn’t that a bit extreme?”
“A kid would never use those words, exactly – but didn’t you ever say when you were little, ‘My parents are going to kill me’?”
“Sure, but – ”
“But you didn’t literally mean your parents were going to murder you.”
“Of course not.”
“Of course not… consciously. On a subconscious level, though, you probably were afraid that the person who was bigger than you, stronger than you, and who was about to get VERY ANGRY at you might actually kill you.
“As we grow up, our rational minds tell us that would’ve never happened. But the childlike belief never truly goes away. Those beliefs play out on a subconscious level as adults, especially with the romantic partners we seek.”
Andrea tried to connect the dots. “So when Cassie broke things off with him, Elias was symbolically losing his mother’s love… and that made him feel unsafe… maybe even like he might die.”
“And people who feel worthless and afraid do some incredibly messed-up things,” Jack said. “To Elias, Cassie was love, self-worth, safety – and when all that was taken away, he flipped out.”
“Where’d you get all of this?”
“Just about every pop-culture self-help book out there,” Jack said with a smile.
“Okay, but let’s say the whole ‘mother angle’ is correct. If he thought you slept with Cassie – by the way, you didn’t sleep with her, did you?”
“No!” Jack said, offended.
“Sorry, I had to ask. But no matter what, he still thought you slept with her. What if he was so enraged by what he thought you did that it drove him over the edge? He hated you so much, and felt so inferior, that he had to prove himself to be superior to you?”
“There are some holes in that theory.”
“So fill them in,” Andrea said with slight exasperation.
“You know what a sociopath is, right?”
“Someone who doesn’t feel guilt or remorse. They’re drawn to power over other people and are pathological liars and master manipulators.”
“Those are some of the biggest characteristics, yes. Sociopaths have a problem empathizing with others and tend to see people as ‘things’ rather than human beings. And though some of them are glibly charming because they learn to manipulate people to get what they want, they tend to have ‘shallowness of affect’ – or very shallow emotions. No deep feelings of love or joy.
“Incidentally, psychology doesn’t use the term ‘sociopath’ anymore. It kind of fell out of use because it was originally coined almost a hundred years ago as part of a theory about people being a blank slate when they were born, which has long since been discredited. But it’s still in popular use.”
“What’s the difference between a sociopath and a psychopath?” Andrea asked.
“Depends on who you ask. ‘Psychopath’ is still a term that’s used clinically, but words go in and out of vogue. After Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho came out back in 1960, ‘psycho’ became slang for anybody with mental health issues, and the establishment stopped using ‘psychopath’ as much.”
He almost made a joke about ‘leaning on pop culture references’ – something she’d accused him of yesterday – then decided things were going well and she might not think the jab was funny, so he just continued.
“Some people say sociopaths are more prone to violence, and others say psychopaths are. Some say sociopaths are made by abusive upbringings, and psychopaths are born. But for all intents and purposes, sociopaths and psychopaths are the same thing.
