Kill Me Once (19 page)

Marlene Aiken’s big blue eyes widened in horror as Nathan Stiedowe calmly snipped her left nipple off.

When he let go of her throat, her horrified scream of pain was deafening, and Nathan watched in amazement as the bright red blood gushed from her severed nipple and down over her belly-button-ringed navel, staining her tight yellow shorts and splashing down onto her legs. Her mother’s screams followed an instant later; screams of murderous rage and disbelief. Howling with impotent fury at the sound of his masters’ suffering, Rocky crashed against the girl’s bedroom door again.

Nathan would have to work more quickly now. Within thirty seconds he had a strip of silver duct tape slapped over both of the females’ mouths, finally shutting the screeching bitches up.

He tossed the bloody scissors back into the briefcase and took out a plastic convenience-store bag before taking a step toward Scott Aiken.

‘No, please, God, no!’ Scott moaned, frantically jerking his head away.

But a moment later the bag was on and Nathan was tightening it around Scott’s neck with the final length of cord. Scott’s gaping mouth desperately sucked away at the blue plastic as he tried in vain to draw a breath into his tortured lungs, the horrified expression on his face alternately visible and then invisible again through the thin translucent material.

Her husband slowly suffocating to death in front of her eyes, Janice Aiken was next. Fully erect now, Nathan leaned over Scott’s flailing body and wrapped his powerful hands around her double-chinned throat, squeezing with all his might until he felt her jugular vein collapse beneath the enormous pressure. She was dead within a minute.

Marlene Aiken was last.
Dessert
.

Tears of horror streamed down her pretty face and streaked her mascara in thick rivers of dirty water as Nathan calmly wrapped his strong hands around her slender throat and began to squeeze. The light scent of her fruity perfume floated up into his nostrils and made him feel dizzy.

‘No time to fuck today, honey,’ he moaned into her ear. ‘Believe me, sweetheart, I’m just as disappointed about it as you are.’

Marlene Aiken’s big blue eyes fluttered as she lost consciousness.

‘As a matter of fact, I’m probably
more
disappointed about it than you are.’

Just then, the gunshot sound of splintering wood down the hall heralded Rocky’s sudden arrival, causing Nathan to turn his head just in time to see the huge dog come barrelling into the master bedroom at full speed. Almost as if the scene were unfolding in slow motion, the animal launched its muscular body through the air, its sharp fangs like yellow daggers pointed at Nathan’s throat.

Acting on instinct alone, Nathan dropped Marlene’s dead body to the floor and whipped a pistol from his waistband in one fluid motion, squeezing the trigger and finally silencing the yapping mutt in mid-air with a single headshot between its eyes.

As Rocky lay convulsing on the bedroom floor three feet away, Nathan moved forward and drew back a powerful leg, kicking the dog in the head as hard as he could. Neck badly broken, the Labrador suddenly ceased its thrashing.

On his way out of the house, Nathan heard Marlene’s pink cellphone vibrating on the kitchen table but didn’t bother answering it. Instead, he simply paper-clipped the pornographic photograph of a naked transsexual to the floppy disk he’d created and tossed it onto the kitchen counter next to the sink.

A bead of sweat slipped down the back of Nathan’s neck as he grabbed the keys to the Aikens’ Infiniti G35 from a hook on the wall and quickly left through the front door. Thirty seconds later he was inside their car and making the short drive over to the nearest Wal-Mart SuperCenter. They were all over the place in Kansas. Big fucking surprise.

He abandoned the car on the west end of the crowded parking lot and took his time walking the two miles back to his own vehicle, thoroughly pleased with his performance.

A mile away from the crime scene, an unmarked car suddenly flew past him with its sirens wailing. Nathan put his head down and spat on the sidewalk when it had passed, the pure
contempt
he felt for Dennis Rader and his pathetic fucking victims setting his teeth on edge.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Dana and Brown screamed up Overlook Drive five minutes later and came to a screeching halt in front of a small well-kept house with Thanksgiving decorations taped to the front door. Seven patrol cars were already parked in haphazard angles on the street out front, their blue and red lights flashing.

A young uniformed cop approached as they left the vehicle, his face white. ‘Nobody inside,’ he told them in a halting voice. ‘At least, no one alive. Three dead bodies and a dead dog.’

Dana’s mind raced. She couldn’t believe that they’d missed him, but he couldn’t be far away. He wouldn’t have had time. ‘Get a dragnet set up in a ten-mile radius,’ she ordered.

The young cop looked sick. ‘Who are we looking for?’

Dana resisted the urge to scream at him. ‘Just detain anyone who even looks suspicious. Ten-mile radius. Get on it now.’

The officer scampered away. A moment later, having contacted LA and ordered McGreevy’s artist’s sketch sent countrywide, Dana and Brown walked through the front door of the house. In the living room Dana stopped a lieutenant who appeared to be in charge. ‘You absolutely sure this place has been cleared?’ she asked.

The lieutenant nodded. ‘Yes, ma’am. Searched it top to bottom myself. Nobody here except the vics.’

Dana stretched her neck. ‘Get everybody out of here right now. I don’t want the crime scene compromised.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’

When the last of the deputies finally cleared out, Dana and Brown pulled on their PPE and carefully rechecked every room for themselves. Three victims in the master bedroom – two females and one male. The male victim had a plastic bag tied tightly over his face. The younger female victim was naked from the waist up and soaked in blood. Dana almost threw up when she saw that the girl’s left nipple had been sliced off.

‘Jesus Christ,’ she breathed.

In the kitchen they found a photograph of a naked transsexual paper-clipped to a computer disk and sitting on the counter next to the sink.

‘Ten to one there’s nothing in the metadata,’ Brown said. ‘What’s the picture about?’

Dana’s mind whirred. Her brain was still trying to tell her something through the hot rush of adrenalin, but it was almost as if the words were coming through in a different language.

Then, suddenly, they clicked into place one by one. ‘I’ll tell you what I think in a minute,’ she told Brown. ‘For now, just run the metadata and see what’s on that disk.’

Brown nodded and left the kitchen, passing Don Jackson as the sheriff was walking in.

‘We must have just missed the motherfucker,’ Jackson growled. ‘This couldn’t have happened more than ten minutes ago. The family car is gone.’

Dana looked up at him. ‘Find out what make it is and get an APB out on that vehicle. Then get on the phone and have them shut the airport down. I think I know where he’s going next, and it’s too far for him to drive. We don’t have time to wait for FBI Headquarters to make the request, and I think he’s going to try to fly out of here.’

Jackson frowned. ‘We’d need FAA approval for something like that. Might take some time.’

Dana glared at him. ‘Time is something we really don’t have right now, Sheriff Jackson. Just get it done as quickly as possible. Please.’

For a moment Jackson looked as though he might protest further, but then he thought better of it. ‘Yes, ma’am. I’ll see what I can do.’

Dana left the kitchen and pulled off her mask. She stepped out of the house and flipped her cellphone open. Outside, two ambulances and three TV news trucks had joined the phalanx of cruisers out front. So much for keeping things quiet.

A pretty young blonde reporter closely followed by a cameraman wearing a backwards baseball cap immediately stepped forward and shoved a microphone in her face. ‘Megan Carter, Channel 4 News. What happened in there, ma’am?’

Dana ignored the question and turned to a uniformed cop twenty feet away. ‘Get a police line around this house and the two houses on either side. Don’t let anyone through without the proper credentials.’

To the reporter, she said, ‘Call me later. I’ll try to give you something in an hour or two, but right now I’m busy. I’m sure you understand. Get my number from Sheriff Jackson’s office.’

When the reporter and other members of the press had been safely escorted a hundred yards away, Dana punched Crawford Bell’s cell number into her phone and brought him up to speed on the latest developments. He’d asked her specifically to call him the moment she had news – good or bad.

Crawford let out a shocked breath. ‘How many killed?’

‘Three.’

‘A family?’

‘Yeah. Murdered just like the Oteros.’

‘Any more weird clues at the scene?’

Dana shielded her eyes against the late-afternoon sun. ‘Yeah. There was a picture of a he-she attached to a floppy disk.’

‘A he-she?’

‘Yeah, you know. A tranny. A girly-boy. A chick with a dick.’

‘Yeah, Dana, I get it. What was on the disk?’

‘Don’t know yet. Brown’s processing it now.’

‘How long will it take?’

‘Ten minutes maybe.’

Crawford paused. ‘BTK was eventually tracked down through a floppy disk, wasn’t he?’

‘Yeah.’

‘That’s what I thought. So at least you’re getting closer. What are your thoughts on the photograph of the transsexual?’

Dana paused to fix the idea in her mind before sharing it with Crawford. ‘You remember that videotape of Richard Speck? The one taken when he was in prison? The one that turned out to be Bill Kurtis’s big break? Kurtis was only local until he broke that story.’

‘You mean the videotape where Speck was smoking drugs with his boyfriend in their jail cell? The one where he had breasts from taking all those female hormones?’

‘Exactly,’ Dana said. ‘After they locked him up, Richard Speck became a tranny. He did it to protect himself on the inside after he murdered a houseful of nurses in Chicago in 1966. That’s where I think this guy’s going to strike next. Or at least where he’s going to
try
to strike next. Have you finished the profile yet?’

Crawford coughed. ‘No. I’ve been dealing with some other things. I promise to get it to you soon.’

Irritation flared in Dana’s chest.
Soon
didn’t cut it in this situation. Not when people were dying. She steadied herself and quickly told Crawford about her attempt to have the airport shut down.

‘Good idea,’ Crawford said when she’d finished. ‘Let me know how things shake out. I want to know
everything
. No holding out on me, Dana. Not now that it’s getting personal.’

‘Will do.’

Dana switched off her cellphone, wondering momentarily what he’d meant by that last line. Don Jackson approached, shaking his head. ‘FAA refuses to shut the airport down. I’ve got the terminal flooded with deputies right now, but that’s the best I can do.’

Dana hissed under her breath. ‘Goddamn it.’ Then calmed herself and said, ‘Thanks, Sheriff. I know you’re doing the best you can. We dropped this shit-storm into your lap at the last minute and it wasn’t fair of us.’

Jackson looked relieved. ‘What else can I do to help?’

‘Just sit tight for now,’ Dana told him. ‘I’ll let you know if and when I need something else, so be prepared to act fast.’

Jackson nodded. ‘Yes, ma’am.’

Dana closed her eyes as Jackson moved away. If it had been a terrorist threat – even a
perceived
one – the FAA would have tripped over its own feet shutting the goddamn airport down. But they wouldn’t do it for a very real serial killer? It was complete and total bullshit.

She was lost in her thoughts when Brown’s voice jolted her back. He frowned and handed her a sheet of paper. ‘This was on the metadata,’ he said.

Dana took the sheet of paper and looked down at it. Big block letters spelled out another message from the killer:

FOOL ME ONCE, SHAME ON YOU. FOOL ME TWICE, SHAME ON
ME
. HAPPY HUNTING, ASSHOLES. I’LL SEE YOU AGAIN REAL SOON. TELL ME, DANA – HAVE YOU FIGURED OUT
WHERE YET?

PART III

UPDATING RICHARD SPECK

CHAPTER THIRTY

Nathan took the off-ramp ten miles south of the airport and pulled into a busy corner gas station to fill the tank of the BMW and buy a cup of black coffee, confident in the knowledge that the authorities would be looking for the Oteros’ Infiniti.
Fucking idiots
.

The sharp smell of fuel burned his nostrils as he unhooked the nozzle and thought about his sacred mission again. There were still many prizes to be had along the way, of course, but the biggest prize of all would be the chance to finally get even with Dana Whitestone, the thieving little bitch who’d so carelessly stolen his life all those years ago. That would be the sweetest gift of all.

He’d
relish
that one.

When the automatic pump clicked off to indicate the tank was full, Nathan went inside and peeled off a hundred-dollar bill from the thick stack that he kept secured with a sterling money clip in the front pocket of his trousers. Handing it over to the obese male clerk with the bad teeth and the drooping breasts of a very old woman, he dropped his gaze to the floor and shifted impatiently while he waited for the idiot to count out the change.

After several interminable moments, he finally looked up again.

Jesus Christ!
The moron’s lips were moving as he counted out the bills!

Just when Nathan was sure he’d be forced to lean over the counter and strangle the life out of the inept clerk for so foolishly wasting his time, the sound of the small gold bell above the door jangled cheerily behind him, causing him to turn his head just in time to see a pair of busty blonde nurses from Wichita General strutting in on their long tan legs and brilliantly white shoes.

And just like that, there it was. The unmistakable confirmation he’d been waiting for.