The Perfect Woman (29 page)

William Dremmel was starting to calm down and think clearly as he drove the Honda Accord he had stolen two streets north of his house. He came out from between two houses and saw the Accord with the engine running and door open, then just jumped in. He needed to get away from the cops kicking in his door and then he’d decide where to go.

How had they found him? He hadn’t even seen anything about Detective Levine on the TV yet. Somehow he’d left a clue pointing in his direction. It was maddening to think some flunky cop had figured out who he was and where he lived.

He fumbled with the radio dial but heard only music this time of night, no news. Traffic was light as he cruised the streets of Jacksonville keeping an eye out for police cars. He made an assessment of what resources he had with him. He had credit cards in his wallet, but using them would mean he could be traced. That left him with just over ninety dollars in cash. He might risk a stop at the ATM later, maybe throwing a misdirection at the cops by getting cash from a ATM machine south of the city, then driving north.

When he saw the sign for Denny’s, the idea of some food and coffee to perk him up overwhelmed any instinct to just run blindly. The fact that the parking lot was empty and it might give him a chance to see the lovely little Maggie Gilson once more aided his decision.

As he walked into the restaurant, Maggie greeted him with a smile as he took one of the empty stools at the counter. There were no other customers.

Maggie smiled. “Hey there, where you been?”

“Just crazy at work. How are you Maggie?”

“Good.” She studied him. “You okay? You look tired.”

He thought about the question for a second and said, “A pipe broke in my house, so I have to spend the night out and see about it tomorrow.”

“Hungry?”

“I am.”

Maggie smiled and said, “Let’s feed you, then we’ll find a place for you to stay.”

William Dremmel managed to smile at the young woman’s perky attitude.

John Stallings felt his body sag as the events of the last few days caught up with him. William Dremmel’s home was a beehive of activity as more cops arrived and neighbors came out on the street of the quiet neighborhood.

Patty Levine had insisted on staying while both Stacey Hines and Dremmel’s mother were transported to the hospital. Patty wore her own clothes they’d found in the closet of the little dungeon. They were probably evidence, but at this point no one cared and it made Patty smile.

Outside the house, Lieutenant Rita Hester was already talking to a few reporters to get out the word about the man they were looking for and warn anyone else out there to steer clear of William Dremmel. The TV stations were going to flash both his driver’s license photo and one found here at the house.

Stallings joined Patty and Mazzetti as the paramedics prepared to move her.

Mazzetti said, “Anything?”

He shook his head. “A kid a few blocks over reported a stolen Honda. It’s out over the radio. Every cop in the city is looking to be a hero tonight.” He turned to Patty. “How’r you feeling?”

“Like a truck hit me.” Her smile told him all he needed to know about her chances for recovery.

Stallings said, “You’re a real hero. Stacey is telling a great story.”

She shook her head. “If you guys hadn’t arrived…”

“You got out of his dungeon and made enough noise that we found you. You did great.” He smiled.

She took his hand and gave him that motherly look she sometimes had. “Have you been at home enough? I know how important they are to you.”

He looked down at the floor.

“John, I hope you didn’t let this case distract you from the kids and Maria.”

He shrugged, too embarrassed to answer. “Don’t worry about it. You’re safe now.” Then he said, “It’s almost over.” He looked at Mazzetti. “C’mon, Tony, let’s hit the street and see if we can find this creep.”

A paramedic raised the gurney with Patty on it.

Mazzetti looked at Stallings. “No, I’m going to the hospital with Patty.”

Stallings smiled and slapped Mazzetti on the back. “Good for you, Tony.” He also felt a pang of guilt for not choosing Maria over the case.

Mazzetti said, “Be careful, Stall. Catch him, but don’t do anything stupid.”

Patty backed up that statement with a hard glare.

Maggie Gilson knew her manager didn’t like any of the employees watching the little TV in the tiny rear office, but the manager wasn’t here at eleven at night. No one was. That was why Maggie had Cesar, the night cook, watching the counter while she sat in the swivel chair in the rear room of the Denny’s watching the twenty-inch TV.

She liked the
Friends
episode that always ran from ten-thirty to eleven, then sometimes she switched over to
Scrubs
for a few minutes. Tonight, right at eleven o’clock she started changing the channels and stopped at the local news when she saw a big banner in red letters that said, “Breaking News.” Usually she cared little about what went on around her, but this caught her attention when she saw a photo on the screen. She thought she knew the man in the photo as the announcer said, “William Dremmel is the focus of a man-hunt for questioning in the Bag Man serial killer investigation.”

Maggie studied the photo and realized it was the guy who had been in the restaurant earlier in the evening and said a pipe broke in his house. That was bullshit. She’d told him about the J-Ville Inn.

She hurried to the employee lockers and grabbed her small Vera Bradley purse, then dug in it until she found her cell phone. Maggie scrolled through the numbers until she found the one person she knew she could trust. Cops could be tough, stupid, arrogant, and, occasionally helpful. But this guy understood people, and he’d know exactly what to do.

She dialed the phone and waited until after the third ring she heard a familiar voice say, “This is John Stallings.”

Maggie knew he’d fix everything, just like he always did.

William Dremmel lay back on the hard bed in room 6 of the J-Ville Inn. The small hotel off U.S. 1 had twelve rooms with the office in the middle. Six rooms went off in one direction and six in the other. Dremmel had paid the scruffy clerk fifty bucks for the room on the end without paperwork or fuss. Dremmel promised to be out by six when the owner showed up.

He’d changed out the tag on the Honda he had stolen, then, as added security, parked the car three blocks away. The only things in the room with him were his stun gun and the clothes on his back.

At dawn he planned to get money from an ATM south of here, then double back and head north. He’d already screwed up his experiment and the life he had; there wasn’t much else that could go wrong except getting caught. He planned to resist that as long as humanly possible.

With time and some ingenuity he hoped to start over again somewhere. Maybe out west or Canada. Now he just had to get away, no matter what.

John Stallings was almost to his house when his phone rang. He flirted with the idea of just letting it ring and checking the message in the morning, but he couldn’t help himself and dug it out of his pocket. He flipped it open just as he slowed in front of his house. There was still a light on in the living room.

“This is John Stallings,” he said as his usual greeting.

“Hey, Stall, it’s Maggie Gilson.”

He had to think for a moment to place the name and face. Then he remembered the cute little runaway who now worked at a Denny’s. “Hey, Maggie. What’s up?”

“I think I might know where the guy on TV, that William Dremmel, is.”

He paused, then said carefully, “Where’s that, Maggie?”

“He was in my Denny’s earlier this evening, and I mentioned a motel on U.S. 1 called the J-Ville Inn.”

“I know the place, just north of Edgewood Avenue.”

“That’s it.”

“Thanks, Maggie, I’ll go over and check myself.”

“I knew you were the right person to call.”

The Shand’s Jacksonville Medical Center was oddly slow tonight even with the reporters crowding the visitors’ lounge hoping to get some kind of scoop from the survivors of the Bag Man. Tony Mazzetti had been here on a Saturday night when there was a full moon and the place looked more like a zoo than a hospital.

Now, in one of the small cubicles off the emergency room, he stood next to Patty Levine, holding her small hand while a nurse came in to check on her. They wanted to admit her for observation, but Patty insisted on spending the night in her own home. He couldn’t blame her after what she’d been through.

Patty hadn’t said much, but she didn’t let go of his hand either, so he knew he was doing the right thing. He just followed wherever they wheeled her, and she seemed happy he was there. He still wondered what was happening with the search for William Dremmel, who he now knew was the Bag Man, and had given him the slip for longer than he cared to admit. Now some rookie road patrol guy would pull over the killer on a fucking traffic violation and be a hero. Shit.

Then his phone rang. He had ignored most calls tonight, because he knew it was just some stupid command staff member wanting an update. This time he saw it was Stallings on the line, so he answered.

Mazzetti said, “Whaddya got, Stall?”

“Tony, I have a reliable tip that he’s out on U.S. 1 at a hotel. Why don’t you meet me there and we’ll see if we can scoop this asshole up.”

“You really think he’s there?”

“One of my old runaways ran into him and gave him a motel that’s safe to stay in.”

Mazzetti’s heart skipped as he considered his chance to really make a splash. If he could catch this guy after being the lead on the case, every news station in town would want to talk to him. A smile broke across his face as he considered the possibilities.

Stallings said, “I’m heading to the J-Ville Motel.”

Mazzetti was about to say he’d be there, then he looked down at Patty and saw the fear in her eyes at the thought of his leaving. She squeezed his hand tighter, and that kept him from answering.

Over the phone Stallings said, “Tony, you gonna meet me?”

Then Mazzetti surprised himself. “No, Stall, Patty needs someone here.”

There was a brief silence, then Stallings said, “Goddamn, Tony, you might be human after all.”

For the first time Mazzetti smiled at something Stallings said.

Before he called in reinforcements, Stallings planned on checking out the small motel. He drove past it slowly twice but only saw an old Ford pickup and a semitractor with no trailer sitting in the lot of the J-Ville Inn. The motel had two wings jutting out from the office in the center.

Stallings drove past one last time and parked around the corner in the lot of a self-storage place. He pulled his shirt over his gun and badge, then approached from the road, walking along the covered walkway next to the first six rooms. He noticed a light on inside the farthest room marked with a number 6 as he crept toward the office. The rooms on either side of the office also had lights on. One had the pickup truck parked in front of it, and the other had the semitractor at a funny angle in front of it.

Stallings was in the glass door and standing quietly before the clerk looked up from an old TV with a half-blown speaker. Craig Ferguson’s Scottish accent seemed to rattle the torn speaker fragment even more.

The clerk had the dark scowl of a pissed-off redneck. Longish greasy hair combed straight back with loose strands spiraling out around his ear. His dark eyes studied Stallings as he made him for a cop immediately.

The clerk said, “What are you doin’ here?”

Stallings showed his badge just so there was no question who he was.

The clerk said, “I know, I could tell the second I looked up. What’s the po-po need here in this shithole?”

Stallings held up a photo of William Dremmel. “You seen this guy tonight?”

The man didn’t hesitate to shake his head. “Naw, been real slow here tonight.”

“Let me see your registrations.”

“You got a warrant?”

“No, but you’ll have one on you if you don’t show me your registrations right now.”

The man was surprised at the aggression. He was apparently used to dealing with the younger, more polite police officers of the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office. Stallings stepped behind the half counter where the TV sat.

“Okay, okay, hang on.” The clerk handed him a book with the list of occupants for the night.

Stallings snatched it from the man’s hand, keeping his eyes on him as he set it on the counter and looked down to see two names, Bob Ura in room one and Dennis Bustle in room seven. Stallings flipped back a few pages to see how names had been entered the last few days. They had nine customers yesterday and six the day before. He looked up at the clerk, who still held a defiant look.

Stallings said, “You only have these two tonight?”

“Yep.”

“So you have ten rooms empty?”

“That’s right.”

“Why was there a light on in room 6 at the end?”

The man hesitated and eyed the phone at the same time as Stallings.

John Stallings was stuck. He knew he couldn’t leave this asshole clerk alone or he’d warn Dremmel in room 6. He called the sheriff’s office to send by a marked unit but knew he couldn’t wait. He grabbed the ring with room keys and pulled the reluctant clerk from the office and had him follow down the walkway as they approached room 6.

Stallings turned and asked, “There’s no back door?”

The sullen clerk shook his head.

“You wouldn’t be screwin’ with me again, would you?” He backed it up with a “no bullshit” look.

“Naw, no back door, and I think he’s in there alone.”

“Why didn’t you tell me that when I asked in the office?”

“You’re a cop. Never help the cops.”

“I respect that kind of commitment. Now sit down right here and don’t move.”

The clerk sat in front of room 4 and crossed his legs. He coughed once, not bothering to cover his mouth. The smoker’s hack sounded toxic already.

Stallings drew his pistol and continued on toward the last room.

William Dremmel was almost asleep when he heard a loud, hacking cough outside. The noise made his eyes pop open. He sat up quickly, reaching for the stun gun on the small night table next to the bed. Then he saw the shadow of someone crossing the window in front of his room. There was no back door. His head swiveled to each side, then up and down searching for an egress. His heartbeat picked up as he felt the walls close in. How had he been found? He clutched the stun gun, stood up, and moved toward the bathroom looking for any possible crevice in the bare room in which to hide.

He swallowed hard as he saw the door handle to the room jiggle.

John Stallings found the key marked “6” and slid it into the lock, while he said quietly, “Is this the day that changes my life?” He had his Glock in his right hand and turned his head every couple of seconds to make sure the clerk didn’t move. His heart pounded in his chest as he considered what a bonehead move this was, but he had no choice. He couldn’t risk losing Dremmel.

As soon as he felt the door lock click open, he shoved the door hard and ducked low, out of the doorway, where he knew he’d be silhouetted by the streetlights. He scanned the room once quickly with his pistol out in front of him, trying to control his breathing.

There was no one here. Stallings rose slowly with his Glock still out in front of him and crept toward the bathroom and closet at the far corner of the room, trying not to give away his position. When he reached the short wall that separated the bedroom from the closet and bathroom he paused, took in a breath, and then darted around the barrier, gun up and ready to fire.

Still nothing. The small closet was completely bare.

He could see into the open bathroom and it appeared empty. He stood to one side and used his left hand to push open the door until it clinked with the wall. He flipped on the single light and checked all the way inside, letting his eyes sweep the tub, toilet, and back wall.

Clear.

Where could this asshole be? Had Stallings’s luck just run out and he missed Dremmel? Had he gone to eat?

He had turned to check on the clerk, when he noticed the paneling inside the bare closet. Something didn’t look right.

William Dremmel had pulled the loose panel back in place, covering him in the hole inside the closet just as the door to the motel room swung open. It was tight and dark, but he could stay in the narrow gap for a while.

He waited, knowing someone was in the room, then, after a few seconds, sensing the person move past the closet into the bathroom. It had to be a cop.

He gripped the stun gun up close to his chest and tried to breathe silently, which was harder than he expected when he concentrated on it. There was no hidden tunnel, just a gap in the wall where he pressed up against the drywall of the main part of the motel room. An insect scurried across his face, but he didn’t move or make a sound.

He heard the light and fan in the bathroom come on. Whoever it was, they were close. A tremor ran through his body as the events of the day caught up to him. He didn’t think his shudder caused any noise as he continued to sulk in his cubbyhole.

Stallings paused, peering into the closet as well as listening for anything unusual. He could hear the light traffic trickle by on the street and the far-off sound of a boom box as the bass pounded off buildings. Then he noticed it. A slight dip in the design of the wall where the ancient paneling didn’t match up just right.

Briefly he considered just unloading a few rounds into the wall. Instead, he reached in with his left hand and probed the panel. He stepped into the closet, pistol ready, and started to pull the panel when he saw some movement, heard a familiar clatter, then felt a tremendous jolt of electricity run though his arm.

The shock threw him back out of the closet as he lost his equilibrium.

Then he saw Dremmel burst out of the closet, leap over him, and dart toward the door.

Stallings rolled to one side, and, still disoriented, rose to his knees then onto wobbly legs.

He heard the buzz of the stun gun again and a scream, raised his pistol, and stumbled around the closet into the motel room.