Peggy Dulle - Liza Wilcox 05 - Till Death Do Us Part (31 page)

“I don’t know. I don’t know much about her except that she’s dead.”

“Who was killed today?”

“A family member of the person who owns the Gardens.”

“How old was she?”

“I’d say in her thirties. Amelia, that’s the lady that owns the Gardens, said she recently got out of prison but she was turning her life around. It’s very sad.”

“It always is, so I guess she was a bleached blonde, muscled bound woman covered in tattoos?”

“She did have a lot of tattoos. I think they covered half her body, but she was petite with long red hair.”

“Did she have on a piece of jewelry that didn’t belong to her?” Kenny asked.

“Not that I know of but she did have a little clown figurine in her right hand and according to her aunt, Tanya hated clowns.”

“Now that is interesting,” Kenny said.

“Yeah, so whoever is killing these people is leaving more than just jewelry.”

“Wait a minute, you said these people, not those women. Are we talking about more than three women?”

My eyes grew wide and Tom glanced over and mouthed, “What?”

I covered the phone and said, “I think I just told Kenny about all the dead people.”

“How?”

“With my big mouth,” I said.

“Stretch!” I heard Kenny yelling at the phone.

“Yes,” I said to Kenny.

“How many people are we talking about? And is this your next case?”

“Thirty, and yes and no.”

“What do you mean, yes and no?”

“It’s not like the other cases. I didn’t get a wrong date on my computer, or an email, or a strange note. When Justin and I started looking into the two Anaheim women’s deaths, you suggested that the jewelry that was left was the key, so we started looking into deaths where jewelry was left at the scene that didn’t belong to the victim.”

“And that led you to other deaths by expanding the search to other things that were left by the killer?” Kenny asked.

He thought just like I did. “Yes.”

“How many deaths?” Kenny asked.

I already shared too much so I might as well spill the rest. “Justin has found thirty so far and I guess the woman today would make it thirty-one.”

“Can I look at the data that you’ve collected on these people? Maybe I can help or come up with an angle you haven’t thought of,” Kenny suggested.

“At this point, I’ll take all the help I can get. All the information is in my Dropbox. Do you know what that is?”

Kenny chuckled, “Yes, Stretch, I do. You’ll need to go on your computer, I don’t think you can share it with me from your iPad.”

“Okay, then I’ll have to do it when I get home.”

“That’s fine. When you get home, call me or call Justin and we’ll walk you through it.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

“Stay safe, Stretch, I don’t like the idea that there is someone out there killing people that look like you and that you might be next on their list.”

“How’d you know that they looked like me?’ I hadn’t shared that fact with Kenny, only the jewelry angle.

“I know how to use a computer, too, Stretch. After you told me about the women in Anaheim I looked them up and I saw the resemblance immediately. And you just told me that the latest victim was in her early thirties, petite, with long red hair. Sound familiar?”

“That describes a lot of different woman, Kenny.”

“None that I personally care about except you, Stretch. We just found each other again, and I’m not losing you again. Is Tom adding more FBI guys to your entourage?”

“You’re not going to become overprotective like Tom, are you?”

Kenny laughed. “Finally, something Tom and I can agree upon.”

I blew a raspberry through the phone at him, which made him laugh harder.

“How far are you from home?”

I wanted to say at the rate Tom was driving it might take all night, but I didn’t. “Maybe an hour or so.”

“Call Justin and have him call me, would you? I’d like to get started looking at what information you’ve got on those thirty victims.”

“Okay, I’ll call him right now.”

“Thanks, Stretch. I love you.”

“I love you, too, Kenny.”

I hung up and dialed Justin and told him to give Kenny a call.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea, Teach?”

“Why?”

“I’ve been some digging into Kenny Martin.”

“La, la, la,” I said, then continued, my voice racing and elevating with each word, “I don’t want to hear anything you’ve found with your digging. I already know about the two people
he’s killed, the time he spent in the looney bin and his monthly therapy appointments. I don’t want to know anything else.”

“Okay,
Teach, settle down. I’ll call him and get him the information about the victims.”

“Thank you,” I said, then ended the call.

“Two people?” Tom said.

“Oh, fuck a duck.” I put my head in my hand.

Chapter 32

“He killed Earl, didn’t he?” Tom’s voice was even and calm, but I could hear the edge to it.

“
Ahhhhh,” I said into my hands.

“You asked
him and he told you that he did and then since I didn’t ask again, you didn’t bother to tell me.”

“It was self-defense,” I said raising my head to meet Tom’s eyes.

“Nowhere in the world, or in any court, is stabbing someone
ten
times self-defense! Remember our discussion of reasonable, excessive, and lethal force?”

“Earl was an abusive, sexually deviant child molester, and a very violent man.”

“It still doesn’t give anyone the right to kill him.”

My back stiffened. “You didn’t know him the way I did. You didn’t see the bruises all over Kenny’s mom’s arms and legs, let alone the ones I couldn’t see. Why do you think Kenny spent his senior year at my house? Earl wouldn’t leave him alone and Kenny’s mom wouldn’t or couldn’t do anything about it.”

“Somebody should have gone to the police, Liza,”

“Kenny tried that the end of his junior year. Earl beat his mom so bad she almost died. But she wouldn’t press charges. She told the cops she was in a car accident. They knew better but
nobody
did anything about it. Earl would have come after Kenny and his mom, no matter where they ran. They were his property and he treated them like that.”

“All that might be true, but it doesn’t justify taking a life.”

“Fine! Try to prove it. Earl’s dead, his ashes are spread at the garbage dump, which was too good for him. I would have flushed him down the toilet.”

“It’s not about proving it at this point, Liza. It’s about what is right and what is wrong. Why was Kenny in a psychiatric facility?”

“When his mother died a couple of years ago, it really upset him.”

“People don’t get put in those types of facilities for being a little upset. What happened?’ Tom asked.

“He trashed his mother’s house and smashed all of the trinkets Earl gave her.”

“And?”

“He took down the two cops that came when the neighbors called.”

“He’s violent, Liza.”

“No, he’s Kenny,” I said as calmly as I could, although I could hear the desperation in my voice.

“I’m going to suggest something and I want you to think about it before you react.”

I turned and glared at him.

“I think these last three women were not killed by the same person who killed the other twenty-eight.”

“Why?”

“The twenty-eight are quick and clean kills. It wasn’t about making the person suffer, it was about killing them. Except for the gunshot victims, the killer used what was available in the house to kill them. It was like he left the choice of death to the victims. But in the last three the killer was violent and out-of-control and he stabbed the victims. A knife was used but it wasn’t from the crime scene nor was it left behind.”

“Okay, I can see how the last three are different than the others. What are you suggesting?”

“I’m suggesting two killers – a serial killer and someone who recently started killing.”

“I can see that. What are you saying Tom?”

“The last three victims all look like you.”

“I can see that, I’m not stupid.”

“No, you’re not and you know exactly what I’m getting at.”

I knew what he was saying and it scared the hell out of me. I put my head in my hands again and mumbled, “You think Kenny killed these last three women because we’re together again and he’s afraid of losing me.”

“Yes,” Tom said quietly. “I think he’s unstable. He’s mad at you because you’re leaving him again, marrying me, and moving to Gainesville.”

“That can’t be it, Tom. Kenny wouldn’t do that.”

“Kenny brutally murdered two people, Liza. He stabbed the first guy five times and then Earl ten times. He could do it.”

“But those were men that were hurting him and his mom,” I said in Kenny’s defense.

“You’re hurting him, too, by leaving him,” Tom suggested.

I leaned my head back on the seat as my eyes filled with tears than overflowed like Niagara Falls. Soon I was choking on my tears. The Jeep stopped and Tom swept me into his arms as I sobbed. I saw the logic in Tom’s words, I saw the three women, brutally killed, and I saw Kenny, laughing and smiling and I sobbed harder. Losing Kenny again would feel like a part of my heart was dug out with a dull knife and thrown away; I’d never get it back, I’d never be whole again. It brought back memories of losing my best friend, Sandy. She was kidnapped and killed. They found her in a ditch. All those memories mixed with the hurt I felt when I was told my parents were killed. Finding Dad last year healed part of the hurt, but it was still there buried with all the other wounds. I felt my heart crack in a million pieces and shatter.

“Liza,” I heard Tom whisper.

I couldn’t respond.

“I love you, Liza. We’ll get through this together. You’re not alone. You’ve got me, your dad, Jordan, and Justin.”

“I want Kenny,” I told him.

I felt him stiffen, but I didn’t care. I loved him but I wouldn’t lose Kenny again. I shook my head, clearing it and said, “I’ll prove he didn’t kill those three women.”

Tom raised his eyebrows, the skepticism clearly evident on his face.

“He didn’t do it and I’ll prove that he didn’t do it.”

“How?”

“I’ll find the person responsible by concentrating just on these last three victims and the fact that they look like me. In the last couple of years, I’ve gathered quite a few people who might want me killed. We’ll go back through all the old cases, from the clown camp to the rodeo. I’ll find the person who wants me dead and it’s not Kenny!”

“Fine, but I have one condition.”

“What?”

“I don’t want you alone with Kenny, ever, not one minute.”

When I started to argue, Tom continued, “If I can’t get that one condition, I’m kidnapping you, right now, and taking you to
Gainesville, we’ll get married at the courthouse up there and skip the whole wedding.”

“After I planned the whole event?”

“It won’t be much of a party if you’re dead,” Tom said, the tone of his voice said it all. He was scared.

“Fine, I’ll give you that condition. You give me one, too.”

“What?”

“If I prove that Kenny didn’t kill those three women, you’ll forget about Earl.”

“But I’m a cop, Liza. I can’t forget about murder.”

“Earl was a bastard. If I could have killed him, I would have. I need your promise that you won’t go after Kenny.”

“I understand what you’re saying, Liza. But you don’t understand what you are asking me to do. I can’t make that promise,” Tom said, shaking his head.

“If Kenny brutally killed those women, then he’s not the man I love, and you can take him to jail and lock him away for their murders and Earl’s, but if he didn’t kill them then I want you to just let it go. Kenny was eighteen years old, his mother was lying in the hospital because she’d been brutally beaten with a baseball bat and her arms were burned in multiple places with the end of a cigarette. One side of her face was smashed in, she had a broken arm and her knee cap was shattered. Kenny couldn’t see an end to it, except his mom’s death.”

I saw Tom shudder as I retold the events of that night.

“The guy was a bastard,” Tom muttered between clenched teeth.

“Yes, he was and if Kenny asked me to, I would have stood next to him and stabbed the guy myself, not just because of what he’d done to Kenny’s mom but also because he tried to rape Kenny. For that alone I would have killed him. But Kenny wouldn’t do it for himself but he would to protect someone else. He needed to protect his mom.”

Tom nodded his head.

“Thank you,” I said and dialed the phone.

“Hi, Teach,” Justin answered on the first ring.

“I want you to concentrate on the last three victims and I want you to go back to our old cases. Find out if anyone that we put away is out or has family or friends that might want me dead.”

“Why are we just concentrating on the last three?”

“Tom thinks, and I agree, that they were committed by someone different than the others. They’re more brutal and the killer is escalating.”

“Yeah, I can see that they are different than the others, and the pattern is escalating. I kept a complete file on everything for all of our old cases. I’ll pull them up and start going through them, locating all the people involved.”

“Thanks, Justin,” I said.

“Tom thinks that Kenny is responsible for the last three murders, doesn’t he?”

“Yes, and how did you know?”

“I was starting to lean that way, too. I just didn’t know how to tell you.”

“Well, I’m going to prove both of you wrong,” I told him.

“I’ll help,” I heard Tom say, just as Justin said, “I’ll help.”

“Thanks,” I said to Justin but was looking at Tom when I said it, too.

He nodded and pulled back onto the freeway.

We drove the rest of the way home in silence, each deep in our own thoughts. I don’t know what Tom was thinking about,but I was remembering the last two years. The clown camp down in Santa Dominga, the town of Clainsworth which used drug money to supplement the town’s income, and Ridgedale, the rodeo town. At least I didn’t have to worry about Emily or Jacki, or I should say, Sasha and Niki Borske; they were safely tucked away in jail.

When we got back to the house, I went directly into the office and called Justin.

“How are you doing with the old cases?”

“I got all the information gathered and put it in your Dropbox. You didn’t have enough storage, so I upgraded your account. It costs $9.99 a month.”

“Did you put it on my credit card?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, I’ll print it. Can you come over and help go through it?”

“Don’t bother I already printed it and I’m already at your doorstep,” Justin said as I heard the front door open.

A few minutes later, the door to the office opened and Justin and Tom came in. In Justin’s lap was a stack of papers six inches thick.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do,” I told him.

“Yes, we do,” Tom said as he took the stack of papers from Justin’s lap and handed me the first picture.

“I’ve printed them in order, so it would be easier,” Justin said as Tom pinned up the first picture.

Jessie McGowan – a little girl who was kidnapped and who I found ten years later.

“How’s she doing, Tom?” I asked.

“Great, it’s nice to have another restaurant in town.”

Her adoptive parents, Greg and Ida, moved to Gainesville, so they could be a family together.

Under Jessie’s picture, Tom placed Carl and Beverly McGowan’s photos. They ran the clown camp in Santa Dominga and got away, taking their adopted daughter, Lori, with them, before the FBI swept in and arrested everyone.

“Do we have any idea where Carl and Beverly are now?” Tom asked.

“No, and I did look for them and any version of their names but didn’t find anything. Their three bank accounts in the Caymans were closed the same day you shut down the camp. Each of them contained over a million dollars.”

“They’re long gone, I don’t think they’d come looking for me. It might cost them their daughter and she was a top priority for them.”

Under those pictures, Tom put up Bruno and Oscar – the clown camp’s goons and Judge Dallas, the judge who orchestrated the illegal child adoptions, getting newborns from out of the country, smuggling them in and then adopting them out to other clown camp employees.

“The judge was disbarred, but no criminal charges were filed. Bruno and Oscar both are out of jail already.”

“Really?” I frowned.

“Yeah, they were only charged with assault on the chief and only did six months of their three year term. They didn’t have any proof that they were involved with the clown camp’s exploits except being its muscle.”

The next picture to go up was Danielle Slammer’s. She was a kindergarten teacher killed in Clainsworth, Oregon. The town thrived on money obtained from selling drugs smuggled into the country from South America in beautifully decorated pots. The plainer version of the pots was used to make a delicious dessert called Apple Pots.

Doc Gordon’s picture went up and Justin said, “He lost his medical license for giving the sodium pentothal to Danielle but other than that, he’s not in jail and he left Clainsworth. I haven’t been able to find him either.”

The next photos were Mayor Brian Galan, Lieutenant Damson, Dave Thompson and the two thugs with the Dobermans.

“These guys are all still in jail. They were the major conspirators in the drug distribution and murders of Danielle Slammers, James Hayes, and Sally Hayes.”

“I wonder if Edith and Bill kept dating,” I said.