The Prophet (9 page)

“Where’s your brother? We need to get going,” Harrison Schofield said to his oldest daughter, Alison.

“I think he’s in the backyard.”

Schofield held up the boy’s Spider-Man backpack. “He may need this.”

Alison sighed with frustration and said, “I can’t take care of everything, Dad.”

He held up his hands in surrender. “Easy, teenager. I mean you no harm.”

She stuck out her tongue, and he gave her a little wink. “Hey, Dad. Are you going to see Grandma today?”

A flash of shame passed over him, and he felt his stomach churn into knots as he thought of his mother. Still, no matter what she had done, no matter the pain she had caused, she was the woman that had given birth to him. A part of him loved her despite it all. Another part hated her and could never forgive her. “Why do you ask?”

“I heard you and Mom talking about it. I was . . . well, just wondering if maybe I could come along. I’m old enough to handle it.”

“Honey, I don’t think
I’m
old enough to handle it. But I tell you what, we’ll see how she’s doing today. If it goes well, you can come on the next trip.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

He finished making lunch for the two younger kids—peanut butter and jelly and apple slices for Melanie and a ham-and-cheese Lunchable for Ben—and packed them into their Dora the Explorer and X-Men lunch boxes. Alison, unlike her siblings, was too cool to bring cold lunch.

As he hurried the girls out the door to the backyard, he heard his son laughing. But a jolt of fear shot through him when he heard a man’s voice. He rushed forward and rounded the corner. He found them standing in the open patch of grass that spanned the distance between his home and that of his neighbor. Ben stood in the snow, wearing a puffy blue coat. A football flew from his right hand. It sailed through the air and was snatched down by an old man with long white hair and a close-cropped white beard.

Ben noticed him and said, “Dad, Mr. O’Malley came over to play catch with me.”

Schofield’s next-door neighbor tossed the ball back to Ben and said, “The boy’s got a wicked arm, Harrison.” O’Malley’s words flowed out in a thick Irish brogue. “He’ll be playing in the NBA before we know it.”

Ben laughed, his head tipping back as his little body shook with delight. “That’s basketball, Mr. O’Malley. Football is the NFL.”

O’Malley laughed with the boy, and Schofield felt a stab of jealousy and anger at how naturally and easily their laughter blended together, like two old friends sharing a joke at his expense. O’Malley said, “Sorry about that, my boy. The only sport I keep up with is soccer. But I did play rugby when I was at University.”

“I play soccer, but I’ve never even heard of rug bees.”

“Oh, it’s a splendid game. I’ll teach it to you when the weather’s better.”

“Did you hear that, Dad? Mr. O’Malley’s going to teach me how to play rug bees.”

Schofield patted his son on the head and said, “That’s great, Ben. But we need to get to school, and Mr. O’Malley’s a busy man.” As he spoke, he tripped over some of the words and tried not to make eye contact with his neighbor.

Ben waved at the white-haired old man as he headed for the garage. “Bye, Mr. O’Malley. Have a good day.”

“You too, my boy.”

Schofield seethed with rage at the old man’s intrusion into his life, his time with the kids, but he kept the feelings bottled deep inside. He turned without a word and started after his son. At his back, the old man said, “Harrison, I wanted to thank you for loaning me that snow-blower contraption.”

Schofield raised a hand in acknowledgment but didn’t turn. He hated the old man. Hated the sound of his voice. That ridiculous accent.

The old man continued. “I’m done with it now, so I’ll just be sticking it back in your garage.”

Schofield wheeled around. “Fine, just leave it outside the door.”

“Oh, this is a good neighborhood, but it could still get stolen if it’s just sitting out like that. Maybe I’ll ask Ben to help me with it when he gets home from school. He’s a good kid. He likes to help.”

“No, we’re . . . busy. The garage is fine.” Schofield quickly shuffled off to join the kids before the old man could hit him with anything else.

He could see through the window in the garage door that the kids were already piled into the Camry. Each breath he took was quick and shaky, and his hands trembled in the cold. He placed a palm on the side of the garage to steady himself. He felt queasy.

He hated that old man. Even the sound of his voice made Schofield cringe. Most of all, he hated that the old man had a habit of injecting himself into his family’s lives. He thought that perhaps, one day, he’d have the courage to do something about it.

The Jackson’s Grove Police Department was a one-story red-brick structure surrounded by bare trees and bordered by a large swath of undeveloped land. Ackerman watched Marcus and the others pull off Route 50 and into the parking lot of the small police precinct. An enormous radio tower jutted into the air over the building, and the lobby and entranceway running through the center of the structure was encased all in glass on its front and ceiling. It reminded him more of something you’d see at a shopping mall. A blue and beige sign announced
Jackson’s Grove Village Center
. Squad cars lined the parking lot.

As he drove past, the killer thought of how destiny, by the hand of some higher power, had led him to this place. He had once believed that everyone was just wandering through the darkness alone. No God, no devil, just men. He had thought of human beings as nothing more than animals that had deluded themselves with the concepts of religion and life after death.

But now, as he looked back on the events of his life, he no longer saw merely random chaos, pain, and death. He saw purpose. He saw meaning. All of that pain had been to mold him, to sharpen him into a finely crafted weapon, an instrument of fate. And it was still molding him, shaping him, changing him. All people were the sum of their collected experiences, and his suffering had made him strong. Just as the events of Marcus’s life had shaped him.

And soon Marcus would truly understand the inner workings of fate. The puzzle pieces would snap into place, and all would become clear. Marcus would look at the world through different eyes. And fate had chosen Ackerman to be the catalyst of this epiphany, just as Marcus had been for him.

He was reminded of a quote he had absorbed somewhere along the way:
A person often meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it.

That was Marcus. He would try to fight fate at every twist and turn, but the destination would still be the same. Fate would win in the end.

Ackerman twisted the blade of his fifteen-inch survival knife and watched the light reflect off the stainless steel. As he admired the weapon, he wondered if he’d first have to remove some of the distractions in Marcus’s life before he could realize his true potential.

Sitting on an uncomfortable gray folding chair in the back of the briefing room, Marcus watched as Detective Sergeant Trevor Belacourt stepped up to a small podium at the head of the room and called for everyone’s attention. A whiteboard occupied the wall at the detective’s back. It was lit by a projector suspended from the ceiling by silver chains. The room had bare cream-colored block walls and windows looking out onto a patch of rural land. A big folding table packed with donuts, coffee, and various creams and sugars sat against one wall. A mixture of uniformed officers and men and women wearing khakis and white shirts and suits filled the room. Maybe thirty people in all. They ceased their conversations and began to take their seats. The whole place had an institutional smell like some community-college classroom—traces of lemon-scented cleaning fluids, coffee, and fumes from erasable markers. He noticed Vasques sitting quietly in the front row.

Leaning over to Allen, Marcus whispered, “I read that Jackson’s Grove is a member of the South Suburban Major Crimes Task Force. Are some of these guys detectives from other precincts in the area?”

Allen just nodded and pointed toward Belacourt, who had begun to speak. The balding commander of the Jackson’s Grove detective division presented the details of the case, directing the gathered officers to the packets each had received upon entering the briefing room. He explained that, since he had worked the Anarchist case before, he would be investigating alongside the lead detective, Marlon Stupak, on it. He instructed his men to coordinate everything with one of them. Stupak stood and gave the room a wave. He was a thin black man with a perfectly shaved head and an overly coifed goatee. His suit looked a little too clean and expensive to Marcus.

Belacourt said, “We are also honored to have Special Agent Victoria Vasques consulting on this case with us.” Vasques stood, looked out over the officers, and nodded curtly, all business.

“As you may know,” Belacourt continued, “a woman named Jessie Olague was abducted two nights ago. If our killer holds to his pattern, then she may already be dead.”

Marcus flipped open his packet and thumbed through the information. Belacourt proceeded to discuss the department’s efforts to stop the killer, but Marcus had little interest in patrol routes and information that he already knew. However, the packet did contain one item that he had yet to read. A profile of the killer.

The document described the Anarchist as a highly organized offender and a white male between the ages of thirty-five and fifty. With that much, and some of the other conjectures, he could agree. But, as his eyes continued down the page, he became increasingly dismayed at the profile’s content. It made several leaps of judgement that he felt were flat-out wrong. It stated that the killer was probably single, though socially adequate and charming in his own way, but also a loner who didn’t like people. It went on to say that he was a narcissist and a psychopath incapable of feeling any remorse for his crimes. He would have problems with women and blame them and others for the issues in his life.

The profile had all the right terminology, but it lacked the proper insight. And it could have been leading the police in the wrong directions. Depending on how much stock they put in it, a profile like this could cause investigators to ignore potential suspects and send them spiraling down a road that would lead to the deaths of more innocent people.

Belacourt was discussing the victim demographics when Marcus raised his hand and waved it back and forth to draw the cop’s attention. Beside him, Andrew whispered, “What are you doing? Put your hand down.”

Marcus ignored him. He was sure that Belacourt had seen him but had diverted his gaze. He persisted with even more exaggerated movements. Finally, Belacourt said, “Yes, in the back, do you have something to add?”

Marcus stood and said, “Yes, I do. I’m Special Agent Marcus Williams with the Department of Justice. I just wanted to let you know that this profile”—he held up the packet—“isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. If you follow this, you’ll never catch this guy.”

Allen whispered, “Sit down, Marcus.”

Belacourt cocked his head to the side and said, “Really, Agent Williams. Why don’t you enlighten us?”

“This profile makes some great leaps that could potentially be sending the investigation in the wrong direction. First of all, there’s no indication of the killer being a loner. In fact, I believe the killer may be married or living with someone.”

Belacourt laughed. “Thank you, agent. But—”

Marcus cut him off and plowed forward. “He takes the victims one night and then holds them somewhere throughout the next day, waiting until the next evening to kill them. This suggests to me that he doesn’t have time to do everything properly on the first night because he needs to get home before he’s missed. He might have a wife who works a night shift like Jessie Olague’s husband did.”

“We’ll take that under—”

“Also, he’s likely not charming or very socially adequate. It would be much easier to abduct a woman from the street or charm them into his vehicle like Ted Bundy did, but this guy doesn’t. He immobilizes them within their own homes without the slightest confrontation, which requires a great deal of work and planning. Then this profile says that the killer is a psychopath, which he isn’t. He hates himself for what he’s doing, but he can’t stop for some reason.”

“Thank you, Agent Williams, we’ll take—”

“Look at the care that the killer has taken with the victims.”

“Care? He drinks their blood, forces their eyes open, and burns them alive.”

“Yes, but only after he’s cut their femoral arteries, which is unnecessary. I think he does that because, true or not, he feels that he’s sparing them prolonged suffering. A psychopath would take pleasure in controlling the women and causing them pain. This guy drugs them in such a way that if he didn’t wake them up they wouldn’t even remember the incident. In his own twisted way, he doesn’t want them to suffer more than necessary. He’s mission-based. He kills to gain something other than pleasure.”

Belacourt stood there for a moment and then said in his nasal voice, “Is that it? Can we move on now?”

“Actually, no. The profile also doesn’t mention anything about a profession or vehicle. I would say that this killer works with numbers or variables in some way. Risk management, insurance, bank, financial, systems analysis. Definitely something white-collar. And he drives either a Toyota Camry, Honda Accord, Toyota Corolla, Honda Civic, Nissan Altima, or Ford Fusion. Those are the top-selling cars of the year.”

Belacourt chuckled. “So that’s really just a guess based on statistical probability. We can look up stats online, too.”

“Sure you can, and so can our killer. That’s why he drives one of those vehicles. He wants to blend in. He doesn’t leave anything to chance. He would have analyzed the data and chosen a car that had the highest probability of blending with others on the road. That’s the way he thinks.”

“Thank you, Agent Williams, for your insight. But it seems to me that the current profile seems more accurate. So, moving on, we—”

“Who put that profile together? It reads like it was written by a cadet. It surely didn’t come from the BAU.”

Allen grabbed his arm. “You need to sit down now.”

Belacourt’s nostrils flared, and his mouth formed into an angry slit. The man had endured enough interruptions. “That’s quite enough. If you attempt to hijack this briefing one more time, I’ll have you removed.”

Marcus dropped into his seat and seethed at the dismissal. Andrew opened his packet to the page containing the profile and pointed to a box in the lower-right corner. It read:
Prepared by FBI Special Agent Victoria Vasques
. Marcus closed his eyes and rubbed furiously at his temples. He had forgotten his migraine medicine at the hotel.

“Smooth,” Andrew commented.

Allen leaned over and said, “Do you know the meaning of the word discretion?”