Busted (12 page)

Joe was feeling a little dazed and just stood next to his car. It had gotten dark, though the parking lot was lit well enough. Sodium vapor lamps cast orange light, making everything seem a little surreal.

An uncomfortable tingle started at the back of his neck and ran down his spine. He shivered and looked around. Someone was watching him. He felt it. There wasn't anyone there. The lot was almost empty, just a few cars scattered around. Nobody was in them.

The lights brightened the lot, but they made things even darker outside their glow. He couldn't see anyone, but he
knew
they were there. Out past the edge of the light. Out in the dark. There was a brief silver flash, like light on the edge of a knife. Suddenly very afraid, Joe jumped in his car, fired it up, and drove straight home.

He slept with the lights on that night.

Wednesday
morning Chris Gagnon was sitting at his desk digging through the medical examiner's preliminary report on the McManus murders. It wasn't complete, since they were still waiting for the toxicology reports, but it was something to go on. The only witness they had was a terrified eight year old girl who wasn't in any shape to talk to them. By mutual consent Steve and Chris had decided not to push too hard, but they couldn't hold off talking to her much longer.

He shook his head. Despite what TV showed, murders like this were rare. There were all sorts of ways that people killed each other, but some sort of ritual? That wasn't normal. Unfortunately it was bad, since these things weren't normally one-offs.

Chris was digging through the back files, looking for any other suspicious deaths that might match. There wasn't much, locally. Usually a good thing, it meant there weren't many people getting killed in his town. For this, though, he'd almost welcome another case like it. Anything to give him more information.

He couldn’t shake the feeling that it was related to the murders four months ago. Manny and Juanita Ramirez had been killed at the Wildbrook apartment complex. It had looked like a revenge killing of some sort – the man had a hell of a rap sheet, and his girlfriend wasn't much better. DUIs, domestic abuse on both sides, drug use, larceny, and some allegations of theft. There were gang ties as well, and the general feeling was their past had come back to haunt them.

The crime scene had nagged at him then. They'd both been knifed, but that was common enough. Messy, but quiet, and very personal. Forensics hadn't found much on the scene, though there wasn't as much of a sign of struggle as they'd usually expected. There was just something wrong about it. He couldn't put his finger on what, but the moment he stepped into the apartment he knew. He and Steve had gone over the place a dozen times, he'd pestered the ME, and harassed all the local drug dealers. He'd even dreamed about the murders.

Steve had given him a hard time about it. Megan had served him the final divorce papers the day before the bodies had been found. She'd been gone for six months by then, but still, it had hurt. Steve was probably right, he was just obsessing over it as a way to avoid dealing with the aftermath of Megan.

Still…

Chris spent the rest of the morning searching through the state's crime database, looking for anything that might match. There weren't too many, which was something in his favor. Working against him was the fact that a lot of the smaller departments were slow to update. Slow being weeks, sometimes months. It was dull work, and by lunchtime all he had to show for it was a half dozen empty coffee cups, a crick in his neck, and a desk covered with papers.

"Well," Steve said as he wandered by. "You've been busy."

"Looking to see if our killer had a prior," Chris said. "No luck so far."

"Me neither," Steve said. He flopped into his chair and sighed. "Talked to the MEs, saw the bodies, tried to talk to the girl again." He grimaced, his ears still ringing from her screams. "That didn't go well."

"Talked to the neighbors yet?"

Steve nodded. "Got the building done yesterday. Learned more about gout than I ever wanted to know from a little old lady on the third floor, but that was it. Going to try the neighboring buildings tomorrow or Friday, maybe someone'll remember something."

He dug through his desk and found the lunch he'd brought. "You check the papers yet?"

"No, not yet." Chris poked at his computer, logging into the archives of the Courant. Half a dozen searches got him nothing, but he kept going. He had the feeling there was something there to find, if he only looked the right way. Grumbling in disgust, he started poking at the other project he'd been working on the past few days.

Joe Hennessey.

Chris had been looking around when he had the time, though he hadn't gotten far. It had taken him two days to watch the whole interrogation tape, all five minutes of it. The worst part was watching himself in it. He had been an asshole, for no good reason.

That shouldn't have bothered him. It wasn't the first time, and wouldn't be the last. Hell, for some of the people he had to deal with his behaviour would be considered polite. Still, he was giving Joe Hennessey crap, Joe hadn't deserved it, and it made him feel bad.

Joe had kissed him. Twice. God help him, the second time Chris had kissed right back, and he wasn't sure he would've stopped at just kissing if Joe hadn't pulled away.

That was a lie. If Joe hadn't pulled away, Chris would've dragged him into the house and fucked him stupid. He still wanted to.

He wasn't going to. Alex would’ve said he should, but he wasn't Alex.

He was a detective, though, and personal feelings aside, there was something odd about Joe Hennessey, something beside the attraction, and the fact that he knew about Alex. He'd mentioned a wake, and that tickled at the back of Chris's brain. He had the name, and on a hunch he started searching.

Twenty minutes later, he had something. "This is interesting," he said, catching Steve's attention.

"What? Find the guy?"

Chris snorted. "I wish. But I found something else. A woman's body was found a few weeks ago, in one of the state parks up by Litchfield. She'd been there a while, but the coroner's report puts her death about three months ago. "

Steve looked suspicious. "So? People die in the parks all the time. Heart attacks, falls, stuff like that. Wouldn't be the first body pulled out of the forest. What does that have to do with our case?"

"There were signs she may have been knifed."

"Great. Please tell me she still had both her eyes."

"No such luck. The body had been out in the woods for a couple of months, though. But… her heart was missing."

"Ah, crap," Steve said. "Animals?" He knew what the answer to that question was going to be, but he had to ask it anyway. Dead people with missing organs were never good.

"Whole thing was gone. Not animals."

"Crap. Crap, crap, crap. Why do you think she's connected? Could be a random thing." Steve was reaching, and he knew it. There weren't that many psychopaths wandering around killing people and removing their organs. Or eyes. Which, on the whole, was a good thing, though there was a lot to be said for a freaky psycho killing being someone else's problem.

"She knew Joe Hennessey," Chris said.

"Now wait just a minute," Steve protested. "That's kind of a stretch. Just because he kissed you doesn't mean he's a murdering nutcase. He just has lousy taste."

"Keep it down," Chris hissed. He looked around the room to see if anyone was paying attention. There were a couple of patrolmen by the coffee, but other than that the room was empty.

"I did
not
say he was responsible," Chris continued. And the fact that he took offense at the suggestion was purely professional pride. Really. "Just that he was involved. We've got two murders, and he's connected to both."

"What? The only reason he was at the crime scene was that he was there with me. Calling that involved is a hell of a stretch," Steve said.

"There's something," Chris said, waving off Steve's protests.

"Like what? One of your hunches? You absolutely sure?"

"Maybe," Chris said, though he was sure about it. He couldn't prove it, though. Not yet.

Steve knew his partner well enough to know exactly how sure of things Chris was. He wouldn't have brought it up if he wasn't sure, and Steve had learned a long time ago to trust Chris' hunches.

"We're going to have to pull in some help for this, if we're going to catch this guy before he kills someone else. We're going to need more than hunches for that." Steve rubbed his eyes.

"We don't have any solid eyewitnesses, and forensics hasn't gotten us anything yet. This'd be easier if we can get something out of the girl," Chris said, sighing.

"Yeah," Steve said. "We've got to get something out of her somehow." Damned if he knew how, though.

Thursday
morning Joe was digging through quarterly employee reviews. His office door was closed and his desk was piled with papers and empty coffee cups, Dave Brubeck playing softly on the stereo in the corner. The electronic twiddle of his phone caught him by surprise. He'd told Joan he wasn't supposed to be disturbed. She knew how much he hated handling the paperwork.

"Hi Joan," he said absently. "What's up?"

"You've got a call from Detective Russell," Joan said.

"Oh, great," he said with a groan. "Can you ask him if I'm under arrest again?"

"I don't think they can arrest you over the phone," Joan said.

"Maybe. Wouldn't put it past him."

"He's on three," she said.

"Hey Steve," Joe said as he took the call. "This isn't a great time."

"Sorry, Joe," Steve said. "I wouldn't normally call you, but it's Stephanie, the girl you found last week."

"She okay?" Joe asked.

"You're kidding, right? She's a mess. We need to talk to her, though. She liked you. You think you can come by and maybe keep her calm enough to get us some answers?"

"Do you think it's a good idea to put her through that after what happened?" Joe wasn't actually sure what happened, but nobody ended up with that much blood on them because of something good.

"It's a crap idea, Joe", Steve said. His voice sounded tired. "But some nutcase sliced up her mom, brother, and sister. He's still out there somewhere, and odds are he'll do this again."

“Uh… Sliced?” The word made Joe’s stomach lurch a little. There had been a
lot
of blood on Stephanie when he’d found her.

“Yeah. It was bad. You don’t want to know how bad. She’s our only witness, and we need to find out what she saw before it happens again. Maybe it won’t help, but we need something. We can’t let this happen again.”

It made sense, but Joe wasn't comfortable being involved in questioning her. It was probably going to be traumatic, and he didn't want to be responsible for that. He wasn’t even sure how much help he’d be. "Don't you have psychologists for this?" he asked.

"And social workers, and Chris who's usually good with kids, but she goes into a shrieking fit when we try. I know it isn't fun, but we don't have anything else to go on yet, and she really responded to you. Please?"

Joe sighed. He knew Steve was right, and he sounded near-desperate. "Fine," he agreed. "I'll come, if you think it'll help."

"Thanks, Joe," Steve said. "We'll take anything at this point."

"Where should I meet you?"

"Group home. 415 Maple, a few streets down from the restaurant we had lunch at last week."

Joe shuddered at the memory. "If I could survive that place, this ought to be a piece of cake."

"That's the spirit," Steve said.

Joe hung up the phone. He grabbed his suit jacket and took one last swig of his cold coffee.

"I've gotta go," he told Joan as he left his office. "Probably won't be back."

"Guess they can arrest you over the phone," she said with a smirk.

"Don't start," he said. "Just… don't."

* * *

Chris stood in the foyer of the group home, looking out through the grime that covered the tiny safety glass window. A few beat-up cars rattled by, punctuated by the thump of tires catching a pothole. Across the street was a row of two story brick storefronts. Most of them were empty, save for a scruffy pawn shop and a bar on the corner. Even this early in the day it was open, a Budweiser sign flickering on and off over the door.

The whole area radiated the sort of grey malaise that settled into your bones and ate away at your soul. Chris could feel it, could see the effect it had on the people who slouched by. He knew half of them by name, and some he probably knew better than whatever might be left of their families.

The flash of silver from Joe’s car as it rounded the corner and parked seemed bizarrely out of place. Chris’ heart lurched as he caught sight of Joe’s copper curls, and the trim body wrapped in a well-tailored charcoal colored suit called out every dirty fantasy and erotic dream he’d had about the man. He felt a stab of guilt at dragging him out here, soiling him with the debris of a dying neighborhood.

Chris watched Joe tug his jacket straight and strode forward. He didn’t look around and didn’t hesitate, as if the surroundings weren’t any concern. As he got closer Chris opened the door, saving Joe the trouble of getting buzzed in through the flimsy security that protected the building.

"Detective Gagnon," Joe said as he stepped into the entryway. His voice was cold and formal, and it hurt Chris a little, especially because he knew he was responsible for most of the distance between them.

"Mister Hennessey," Chris replied, his tone matching Joe’s before he could change it. "Stephanie's upstairs."

Joe brushed past him and started up the stairs. Chris followed, hands jammed in his pants pockets. It was the only way he could think to keep them from reaching up under the suit jacket and touching Joe. Stupid hands. Stupid jacket. Stupid
pockets
.

"Any idea who did this to her family?" Joe asked. He didn’t look at Chris as he talked, but his voice echoed through the stairwell and seemed to come from everywhere.

"Maybe. We have some details on a half dozen cars from some witnesses. Got a lot of information on the husband, less on the woman, her family is from out of state. The killer’s done this before, we have a connection to two other crimes, and ties to gangs in the southwest. The guy was careful, forensics didn't find much at all at any of the crime scenes, unfortunately."

The words just tumbled out. Chris wasn't at all sure why he was saying them. Normally he wouldn't. Hell, it was a murder investigation, he really shouldn't be telling Joe anything.

"Got that already? I'm impressed."

Joe’s sarcasm stung, more than it ought to have. "We're detectives. Sometimes we detect things," Chris snapped back.

"Who'dve thought?" Chris saw Joe shrug, shoulders rustling under the suit jacket

Chris chose to ignore it, though it hurt. "Her parents were separated. We're still looking for the relatives on her mother's side. We know who the father is, but we haven't found him."

"He dead too?" Joe asked as they got to the top of the stairs.

Chris snorted. "No, just an asshole. Six months behind on his child support."

Joe looked around. The stairs went up another two floors, but Chris wasn't pushing to go up another flight. This was mostly because he was fighting to not notice how the light material of Joe's dress pants fit his legs. It was such a good thing Joe was wearing that suit jacket. Between the hangover and the dreams he was feeling like crap. Chris wasn't sure how much self-control he had.

"Great," Joe said. Chris' struggles went unnoticed. "Where now?"

"Rec room at the end of the hall," Chris said.

"So who is he? Or can't you tell me that?"

"He's officially our prime suspect. It's not a secret, not for something like this." Chris dug around in the pocket of his jacket and pulled out his notebook. His head was throbbing something fierce, and he wasn't thinking that well. He flipped through a few pages, buying time.

"He's Billy O'Malley," Chris said after he found the right page. "A.K.A William J. O'Malley. Sometimes 'Studs' O'Malley. Has a string of priors, mostly DUI or drunk and disorderly."

Joe whirled and stared at Chris. "William
James
O'Malley? Thirty-five? Five nine, red hair, worthless piece of shit?"

Chris recoiled a little from the venom in Joe's voice. "Maybe. He's bald in the pictures we have." He opened the folder and took out a picture. It was a family photo, a few years old. A woman, maybe thirty, looking a little worn, was holding a small child. Two girls were standing next to her, one on either side. The younger of the two was Stephanie, the older must've been her sister the resemblance was so strong. And to their left was Billy. Bald, wearing a t-shirt and black leather vest. He was bulky, like he worked out a lot and drank even more. Tattoos were clear on both arms, bits of his face were pierced, and even in the picture you could see he was freckled all over. His head was shaved bare.

"Bastard. Utter, fucking
bastard
," Joe spat. "583-5555."

Chris' eyes narrowed. He was suddenly very angry. Joe obviously knew and hated this guy. Chris could only think he had to be an ex-boyfriend. He didn't know what was worse; that Joe would date someone obviously married, that he'd date someone who was such a cretin, or that the bastard had hurt Joe so badly.

"So you know him," Chris said. Carefully. Coldly. "That his number?"

"No," Joe said, opening the door and stepping into the rec room. "It's our mother's."