The Butcher (27 page)

“Okay.”

“He wasn't even surprised when I called asking about the missing files, said he figured that somebody, eventually, would notice. What he told me was that the Butcher had another element to his signature. Everybody knew about the hands, of course, because that was made public. But nobody knew about the hair.”

“Why?”

“Because he was advised to leave that part out.”

“Okay,” Sam said, her mind working. “But that happens, right? The police don't always release everything to the media. For lots of reasons.”

“That's true. But internally, the missing hair should absolutely have been in the autopsy reports.”

“So why wasn't it?”

“Like I said. Bradbury was instructed to leave it out.”

“By who?” Sam said, still confused. “And . . . why?”

“By Captain Edward Shank, lead detective on the case.” Sanchez grimaced. “Bradbury said that Edward Shank made it very clear he didn't want the hair mentioned anywhere, that it was to be kept secret. Nobody on the task force even knew; it was only Shank and Bradbury. The ME said that at the time, the Chief wanted to minimize leaks, to help distinguish the real Butcher murders from the copycats. And back then, leaks were rampant at Seattle PD. Stuff was always getting out.”

“Yes, and there were two copycat murders already.” Sam rubbed her temples. “Okay, so I get why Edward wanted that kept out of the
reports during the investigation, but once Wedge was shot, shouldn't there be full disclosure?”

“That's an excellent question, and one we'll have to ask the Chief. It's possible he might have forgotten he'd had that info redacted earlier, what with all the media coverage after Wedge was shot. But whatever the reason, the reports are missing. And while Bradbury has no reason to lie, I can't actually confirm if what he's saying is true. Because the reports are just gone.”

“And you can't exhume the bodies because hair decays after a year or so,” Sam said, recalling what she'd read in her homicide investigations textbook. The same textbook, ironically, that had been a Christmas gift from Edward Shank.

“Right.”

Sam leaned back in her chair and stared at the detective. “So what about Jamie Chavez? Was she missing a swatch of hair?”

“Yes.”

“And what about Bonnie Tidwell?”

“Yes. Her, too.”

Sam closed her eyes as the weight of it finally hit her. “So you're looking for the Butcher. Holy shit.”

“We could very well be.” Sanchez wrung his hands. “I personally think so, but we'll have to be very careful about how we present this to the public. It's one thing to be searching for a new Butcher. It's a whole other thing to be searching for the
old
one.”

“Because that means Rufus Wedge didn't do it,” Sam said, her voice faint. “Which means Seattle PD shot the wrong guy.”

“Yes. And yes.” The detective leaned forward. “And there's deeper ramifications than even that. I ran a query on female murder victims between the ages of fourteen to nineteen, who were missing swatches of hair. Other than your mother, there were two, one in 1989, and another in 1993. Both
teenagers, both brunette, both missing hair from the same spot. Hands intact, though, which is why it didn't flag. And two wasn't enough to point to a serial killer, especially since the murders were four years apart. One was found in southern Oregon, and the other in northern Washington.”

“And it also didn't flag because the hair from the Butcher cases was never reported,” Sam said, horrified. “Oh God, this just keeps getting worse and worse. If the Chief hadn't decided to keep that information quiet, three more women, including my mother, wouldn't have died.” Her voice was bordering on hysterical.

The detective grimaced. “In Edward Shank's defense, he did the best he could under the circumstances. You were too young to remember what it was like back then, Samantha. The city was
freaking
out,
to borrow an expression from my kids. The body count was piling up, and there were already two copycat murders. The whole investigation was becoming a nightmare. Seattle PD was under a tremendous amount of pressure to find the Butcher, and I can understand why Shank thought he was doing the right thing by withholding certain bits of information. But now, in hindsight? This is a fucking mess.”

“Are you going to do a press conference?”

“Eventually, but not until we know exactly what we're looking for. Connie Lombard wants this quiet until we know just what we're dealing with.”

Sam nodded. That made sense. Constance Lombard was the current chief of police.

“Right now the official tagline is that we're looking for a
new
serial killer with similarities to the Butcher,” Sanchez said. “We're not going to say anything about Rufus Wedge being the wrong guy until we're absolutely fucking sure.”

Sam sat back, her eyes welling up with tears. On the one hand, she felt vindicated. Her theory about Wedge being the wrong man all along
was about to be proven true. But all she felt inside was . . . empty. Her mother was still dead. It really didn't change anything at all.

“You okay?” Sanchez asked softly.

“I don't know.”

“When this comes out, you'd better believe it's going to be a media frenzy.” The detective closed his eyes for a moment and swore under his breath. “You say nothing, you understand? I told you because I know you need the closure. But this goes nowhere outside this room. You don't tell your boyfriend. Nobody. Tell me you hear me.”

“Loud and clear, Bobby.” Sam wasn't about to argue. “So then who the hell is the Butcher?”

“I don't know, but we'll catch him.”

“And who's going to tell Edward?”

“That he headed up a task force that killed an innocent man?” Sanchez laughed, but there was not one trace of amusement in it. “I don't know, but it sure as shit isn't going to be me.”

Matt tried calling Sam again, but her phone went straight to voicemail, which meant one of two things: either her phone was off, or she was hitting the
IGNORE
button as soon as she saw his name and picture pop up on her iPhone.

Pretty easy to guess which one it was, since Sam's phone was never off.

He knew things had been distant between them, and yeah, he'd definitely been a shit to her lately. Okay, if he was forcing himself to be totally honest, he'd been a shit to her for a lot longer than “lately.” He'd always put his career before his relationship with Sam, but could anyone blame him? He'd had an incredible wave of success for someone so young.

But here was the thing . . . he missed her. He missed her in a way he didn't think was possible. He missed her laugh, he missed her smile, he missed her face.

Sam had always been there for him, always doting on him, always so proactive about making sure they had plans to see each other, always thinking up fun things for them to do. But in the last few weeks, she had stopped all that. She hadn't been around at all. She wasn't interested in his reality show. She'd
stopped coming by the restaurant to say hello. She hadn't slept over at his place in weeks, not since he'd moved into the Chief's old house. Other than that weird night when she'd snuck into his house only to catch him watching a porno, she seemed completely uninterested in his life.

And he hated it. Because he realized now that he'd been taking her for granted, and that his life seemed
less
somehow without her in it.

The camera crew was packing up their equipment and Matt stifled a yawn. He thought the first couple of tapings had gone well. There'd been some drama between himself and one of the servers. One of his bartenders was a charismatic dude and he'd had some funny, candid moments. A baseball player for the Seattle Mariners had come in to have dinner with a few of his buddies (arranged by the good folks at the Fresh Network, of course), and that had been completely entertaining because one of the guys in the group hit on a waitress that he'd already slept with but had forgotten about. It had been fun.

Karen was in front of him suddenly, and Matt blinked.

“That could not have gone better today. You're a star in the making, Matt.” The producer's voice lowered to a purr and she put a hand on his arm. “Why don't we go somewhere and decompress? Change of scenery and some drinks? We can talk about just how far your star can . . . rise.”

He stepped back, refraining from rolling his eyes at her cheesy come-on. What the hell had he ever seen in her? He honestly couldn't remember now what it was about her that he'd found so attractive initially. What a colossal mistake she had been, and as far as he was concerned, it would never happen again. With her or with anyone.

“I'm sorry, Karen, I can't. I have plans with Sam.”

“Bring him along.” The producer winked. “I don't mind.”

“Sam. As in Samantha. My girlfriend.”

“Oh.” Karen's body language immediately shifted from hot to cool. “Gotcha. Okay, well I'll see you tomorrow. We'll have one more day of shooting, then we'll do an edit and see what we've got.”

“Sounds good,” Matt said. “Have a nice night.”

She left, her step a little quicker than usual, and Matt waited around until the camera crew finished packing up their gear. It had felt a little strange to lie to Karen about having plans with Sam, because obviously they had no plans. He tried calling her again, and again it went straight to voicemail. Where the hell was she?

Matt said a quick goodbye to the Fresh Network crew, and then locked the door behind them after they left the restaurant. Clicking lights off, he headed back to his office to get his things so he could exit out the back way as he always did.

Maybe Jason would know where Sam was. Jase always seemed to know. Matt tried calling his friend, but Jason's phone, which was also never turned off, also went to straight to voicemail.

Okay, for real now, what the
hell
was going on? Why wasn't either of them answering?

And come to think of it, Matt hadn't seen or heard from Jason in a while, either. Scrolling quickly through his phone, Matt located the last text message he'd received from his friend.

Well over a week ago.
Huh
.

The little seed of suspicion that had been in Matt's brain for a long time was finally beginning to sprout. Clenching his fists, he felt himself begin to swell with an anger so intense, it couldn't possibly be rational.

So help me God,
he thought, the rage seeping into his pores.
If they're fucking each other, I will kill them both
.

Trying to get into Jason's condominium was like trying to break into Fort Knox. There was a doorman and a security guard on staff at all times, but if Matt was going to catch his friend fucking his girlfriend, then he didn't exactly want them calling the ex–Seahawks quarterback upstairs to let them know he was coming up.

Matt was parked in his utility van across the busy city street in Jason's neighborhood off Denny Way, the engine idling, staring into the well-lit lobby of his friend's building. It was a fancy-ass place, filled with people who had money. Mind you, Matt wasn't resentful of his friend's success in the NFL—if you could make millions of dollars playing any sport professionally, why the hell wouldn't you?—but at times he did resent Jason's
face
. It was handsome, recognizable, and it opened a lot of metaphorical doors, something Matt was still working on.

Well, not the handsome part.

Once upon a time Matt had thought about living in a building like this, but then his grandfather had announced that he was giving Matt
the house. Which, at the time, had seemed like the greatest gift ever. But now he wished it hadn't played out that way. Because if Matt had moved into a building like this, he would never have dug up that goddamned crate in the backyard, he wouldn't know his grandfather was a serial killer, and he wouldn't be having nightmares about PJ Wu.

Continuing to stare into Jason's building, Matt considered his options. He could either shift the van into drive and head back home to leftover stew and whatever was recorded on his DVR, or he could let the doorman announce his arrival to Jason, which would then give Sam a chance to hustle out as he was riding the elevator up to the penthouse.

Unless . . .

He killed the engine.

Didn't he have the code to Jason's side door entrance somewhere? He couldn't remember the reason Jason had given it to him, but Matt could remember using it at one point. Grabbing his iPhone, Matt clicked through it, opening a note labeled “Miscellaneous” where he stored bits of random information. It took him a few seconds of scrolling to find it, but yes, there it was, aptly titled “Jason's side door code.” It was 131313. No surprise there; thirteen had been Jason's Seahawks number.

Matt stuck his phone in his pocket and locked the van door behind him. The damp chill caused him to shiver a little as he made his way across the busy street and around the building to the other side, where there was a glass door and a keypad. Punching in the code, he waited, and a second later the door opened.

Yeah, baby
. It was almost too easy.

He made his way down the softly lit hallway to the elevators, which were located just off the lobby. A quick punch of the button and he'd be in the elevator before anyone saw him. But before he came close to reaching the doors, the uniformed doorman appeared in front of him.
Shit
.

“Good evening, sir.” The doorman smiled, his shiny white teeth contrasting against his dark skin. Though pleasant and polite, his eyes were sharp, and the man was built like a pit bull. Likely ex-military. “May I ask to see your ID?”

“I'm just going up to see a friend.” Matt's heart rate picked up, but he managed to sound calm and confident. “He gave me the side door code to make things quicker.” He stepped to the side, a lame attempt to get around the doorman. Behind him, Matt could see the security guard, who was also built like a pit bull but with paler skin, watching them both.