The Recruiter (A Thriller) (19 page)

By three o’clock in the afternoon, the small gathering of family and closest friends is assembled in the living room of the Forbes home. Peter’s mother and father dominate the area, tall, good-looking people who possess the calm assuredness of the successful and strong-willed. Alternately, they make lists and phone calls of anyone who might know of Peter’s whereabouts.

Beth sits on a kitchen chair that’s been pulled into the living room, watching the scene before her in disbelief. It’s been six hours since she received the phone call from Mrs. Forbes, asking if she knew where Peter was. Three hours later, Beth had called back to see if he’d shown up. She pictures Peter with that loveable hangdog expression he used sometimes, even more handsome when he’s sheepish.

Mr. Forbes had given her the bad news. Peter was not answering his cell phone, and it appeared as if he’d simply vanished.

Ordinarily, it may not have been such a big deal. But Peter had been scheduled to meet with a Marquette alumni. His parents insisted that Peter would not have missed the meeting unless something had happened.

Now, Beth waits in the living room, feeling more than a little awkward. She isn’t sure how many of the people there knew about the problems she and Peter had.

Beth figures Peter hadn’t told anyone. He was never the kind of guy to confide in his buddies. Even though he likes them and enjoyed their company, she knew that in some ways he didn’t respect them, didn’t truly consider them equals. Suddenly, with an audible gasp, she realizes she’s thinking of him in the past tense.

Beth immediately gets to her feet. She has to do something, anything to help. She can’t just sit and wait.

The Forbes home is big, especially compared to Beth’s. Mr. Forbes is a well-known attorney, and Mrs. Forbes is an interior decorator. The house reflects his professional stature and her impeccable, contemporary taste.

Beth walks through the living room and down a short hallway to the kitchen. Mrs. Forbes is sitting at the kitchen table with a cell phone in her hand. As Beth enters the room, she hears Peter’s mother offering her thanks, in spite of what sounds like no news.

The older woman thumbs the disconnect button and looks at Beth.

“I’m glad you’re here, Beth,” she says.

“I just know he’s going to walk through that front door any minute with a dopey grin on his face,” Beth says, smiling, forcing an easy tone in her voice that she hopes sounds natural.

Mrs. Forbes nods, but Beth can see there’s no confidence in the gesture.

“Can I get you anything to drink?” she asks Beth.

“No, thanks. Don’t worry about me. You’ve got enough on your mind.”

“Sit down, Beth, I’d like to talk to you.”

Beth pulls out the chair across from Peter’s mom. She knows where this is going.

“How were things between you and Peter?”

Beth hesitates. A part of her feels like it’s nobody’s business but hers and Peter’s. But she sees the concern in Mrs. Forbes’ eyes. Now’s not the time to keep secrets, even though she’s more than sure wherever Peter is, it has nothing to do with her.

“We were going our separate ways,” she says at last.

“Was it a mutual decision?”

How to answer that one? Beth wants to tell the truth, but doesn’t want to besmirch Peter, especially when his mother is vulnerable.

“Well, not at first. But Peter…started seeing another girl, and that kind of put an end to things.”

“What girl?”

“Vanessa Robinson.”

“I see.”

“We were going to try to keep the relationship going even after Peter went to Marquette, but my injury and…”

Mrs. Forbes looks at her, silently urging her to go on.

“…Peter’s anxiousness to get on with his life kind of took over.”

Peter’s mother sits back in her chair. She jots down Vanessa Robinson’s name and the word “call” in front of it. Then she looks back up at Beth.

“He cares a great deal about you, Beth,” she says.

“I feel the same way about him.” Beth pats the older woman’s hand as she begins to cry.

“I’m sure he’s fine, Mrs. Forbes.”

But even to Beth, the ring of confidence in her voice sounds a little hollow.

This is what it feels like, Anna thinks.

She was too drunk to notice before.

But this is what it must have been like for Beth, she thinks. Sitting by the phone. Waiting for the mail carrier with suppressed high hope building in your gut, only to wade through a bill or two, a hardware store flyer addressed to “occupant.” Left with nothing but bitter embarrassment over having gotten your hopes up in the first place. And the phone. Waiting for it to ring again and again and again, willing it to ring, and when it finally does, it’s a wrong number or a solicitor. Barely being able to speak to the caller on the other end of the line, the wrong caller. Not the caller’s fault, but you hate him anyway.

What Beth must have gone through, Anna thinks. And to top it off, Beth had a drunk mother who barely noticed any of it.

For the fiftieth time that day, Anna cries.

Anna goes into the bathroom and wipes her eyes with Kleenex. She looks at herself in the mirror. She had been pretty once. A long time ago. But now she looks like an old dishrag. Wrinkles, dark circles, and rheumy eyes. She looks fifteen years older than she is. She feels even older. But the features are there, she thinks. A delicate nose, good cheekbones…all in all, not bad. She admits she looks a lot better since she stopped drinking. The puffiness is gone. If she could lose a few pounds, get some sun…hell, she might not look half bad.

The thought seems to bolster her energy.

She takes a moment to get her bearings. She
has
stopped drinking. She
is
looking better. There
are
things she can do.

Goddamn right,
she thinks.

The fight isn’t over yet.

Anna walks back through the kitchen, her stride firm and quick. She goes to the small roll-top hutch and slides back the flimsy wooden cover. From beneath a pile of old papers, she retrieves the notepad filled with the names and addresses of local college basketball coaches.

There are eight of them.

Each one received a copy of Beth’s highlights.

And she has heard from none of them.

Anna takes the notepad to the kitchen table and grabs the cordless. She punches in the first number. A Robert Mundt, head women’s basketball coach at Lawrence College, a small private school halfway to Ann Arbor. Anna gets the front office and is transferred to Coach Mundt’s line.

While the phone rings, Anna makes doodles by the other names on the list. Her heart is beating faster in her chest, and her mouth is dry. She knows she isn’t following decorum. These coaches probably get inundated with anxious parents who think their children are wonderful athletes. Anna fully expects to be met with bored, cynical indifference.

On the fifth ring, a man answers.

“Coach Mundt,” the voice says, a deep raspy baritone. Anna thinks it’s appropriate, probably from screaming on the sidelines.

“Mr. Mundt. My name is Anna Fischer, I sent you a highlight reel of my daughter Beth—she was a point guard on Lake Orion High School.” Anna pauses. She hears a rustle of papers.

“What was the name again?”

“Fischer. Beth.”

Another rustle of papers. Anna is sure the next words are going to be along the lines of
sorry, no space left.
She was good, but not good enough.
Instead, the three words that follow surprise her.

“Never got it.”

“Are you sure? You should have gotten it by now.”

“No, I would have remembered. We don’t get a lot of interest from potential recruits. I definitely would have remembered. Beth Fischer. Nope. Never got it. If you have an extra, don’t bother sending it. I signed the last girl yesterday. No more spots open on the roster. Sorry.”

Before Anna can get a word in, she hears a dial tone and the soft pounding of her own heart.

She grits her teeth and punches in the phone number of the next name on the list. The phone is pressed tightly against her ear when the coach on the other end of the line tells her that she didn’t receive any package regarding Beth Fischer. And, oh, by the way, the roster is full. No more scholarships. Sorry.

After getting the same answer from the third coach, she determinedly dials the next five numbers, and by the end of the last call, she is in tears again.

Not one single package had arrived.

And there is not a single spot on any roster available.

Every scholarship has been awarded.

She has failed Beth once again.

Anna gently sets the phone back in the cordless and puts the notepad back in the desk. She gets her car keys, locks up the house, and walks to her car. She can already see it in her mind: the wall of booze at Mack Liquor. Rows upon rows of whiskey in every shape, size, and variation of amber she can dream of.

It isn’t until she’s halfway there, that the realization hits her.

She had asked Samuel Ackerman, the recruiter, to send out the packages.

He never did.

It hits her with stunning force. She considers other possibilities, but discards them all. There can be no way it’s a coincidence.
Every
package failing to arrive?

Ackerman never sent them out. He wants Beth for the Navy.

Suddenly, she doesn’t want whiskey. Instead, she wants to confront Ackerman.

Perhaps she will tell him that he got her to do the most despicable, most degrading act of her life. After years of wallowing in booze, of ignoring her daughter, of mourning a dead husband for far too long, she committed an act that she instinctively knows will haunt her until she dies.

She trusted him.

Samuel presses the electric carving knife against Peter’s throat and depresses the on switch. The blade comes to life, deceivingly slow, and immediately bite into the tender skin. A quarter-inch gap opens, deep red on the inside, as thick blood seeps from the open wound, but Samuel has Peter stretched out in the bathtub with the water running. Samuel, with one hand grasping Peter’s short hair, pulls the head forward and cuts all around the neck with the carving knife. But still the head hangs on.

Sweat pours from Samuel’s forehead. He grabs a washcloth from the towel bar and wipes his face. His stomach doesn’t feel right. He’s already puked in the toilet once, and the occasional pop and fizz in his belly nearly sends him there again. But he swallows and urges his mind to stay in control. His head is on fire, the pain in his temples blindingly white-hot. Samuel grits his teeth and bears down on the knife.

He’s got to get this done.

He must cut off the head and hands, throw them in a dumpster somewhere, then dump the body somewhere else. He has already destroyed the kid’s cell phone and flushed the pieces down the toilet.

But the fucking head is giving him problems.

It’s the goddamn spinal cord.

Samuel repositions himself, getting a leg up on the bathtub’s ledge, and with the additional leverage presses the knife harder against the bones in Peter’s neck.

But the blade grinds and jumps while the head remains stubbornly attached. The sound of the knife grinding on the bone, the sight of the kid’s mouth hanging open, the nostrils flared wide open makes Samuel retch. Nothing comes out but a gaseous belch.

Samuel shuts off the carving knife.

It’s not supposed to be this hard. He needs to upgrade his cutting utensil. A Sawzall would do the trick, but he doesn’t have one. He could go to the landlord’s apartment and see if he’s got one, but that’s something that would be remembered, something the cops would pick up on when they come around…and Samuel is guessing they will come around eventually.

He has to get the body and all evidence out of here.

He has to do something with this asshole’s car.

But first things first.

Samuel sets down the carving knife, goes into the kitchen, and from the long utility drawer retrieves the butcher knife. A thick cleaver with a dark, wood handle. He starts back toward the bathroom, stops, and grabs the butcher block carving board from the kitchen counter.

Back in the bathroom, he sets the knife and cutting board down on the white tile floor, reaches into the tub, grasps the kid’s feet and pulls him forward so that his back is flat on the bottom of the tub.

Samuel picks up the cutting board and wedges it beneath the kid’s head. With his left hand holding Peter’s head so that the chin is tilted up, giving Samuel a clear shot at the neck, he swings the butcher knife in a short, sweeping arc.

Peter’s head comes free in Samuel’s hand.

The bloody stump of the neck seems to point at Samuel, and he retches again. This time, a small tendril of puke and saliva drips onto his chin. He wipes it off with his sleeve then calmly chops off each of Peter’s hands.

He drops them next to the head, beneath the downspout of the tub, letting the water wash away the blood. Samuel rinses his hands then goes into the bedroom and finds a pair of thin, black leather gloves. He slips them on his hands and heads into the kitchen for trash bags. He brings them into the bathroom and places the head in one bag and the hands into another one, then gathers the ends of the bags and spins them shut, tying each closed with a double square knot.

Next, the body.

Samuel guesses that Peter is over six feet tall. He doubts that he’ll be able to get him into a trash bag. And the idea of trying to cut off the kid’s legs seems insurmountable. He really would need a Sawzall for that.

Instead, he gets the keys from the kid’s pockets and pulls the Explorer around to the back of the apartment. He thanks God that it’s still dark out. Hopefully, no one will remember seeing a Ford Explorer backed up to the rear of Samuel’s apartment. The narrow walkway where he keeps his grill is almost completely blocked from view. He backs the big SUV up to the walkway, which will make the trip from the back door to the trunk a little over ten feet, but it’s ten feet that is completely blocked from view, especially with the Explorer now in place.

Samuel goes back into the apartment and retrieves the separate garbage bags containing the head and hands. He goes out the back door, scanning the area around the walkway, but there’s nothing to see. And no one to see him.

He sets the bags in the trunk then pauses for a moment as he hears the sound of a car, but it’s far away, and the sound dissipates in a matter of moments. The stars are still out, and a cool wind dries the sweat on his forehead. Suddenly, he feels very alive. The throbbing in his head is gone, and he claps his hands together. Goddamnit, he’s going to do this.

He goes back into the apartment, any feelings of nausea completely gone, and picks up the area rug from the living room. It’s worn and threadbare, a faded pattern made of some flimsy manmade material. He carries it into the bathroom and sets it on the floor. It’s bigger than the entire floor space of the bathroom, but the sides simply lay up against the walls of the small room. Which is perfect for Samuel’s needs.

Samuel leans over the headless corpse of Peter Forbes and scoops it up into his arms. He lifts it, water dripping, and sets it down on the area rug. The neck stump brushes against Samuel’s cheek, and he momentarily has a surge of nausea, but he fights it back down.

He arranges Peter’s body into a fetal position and wraps the area rug around it.

A corpse burrito.

Samuel carries the rug and its contents to the back of the Explorer. He sets it inside with the edges of the rug on the bottom, holding the contents inside. He shrugs off his shirt and pants, and tosses them in the trunk, and then shuts the Explorer’s rear door.

Samuel hurries back into his apartment. He checks the clock. Three thirty a.m. He must do this quickly.

He puts on black jeans, a black turtleneck, and a gray windbreaker. From his closet, he also retrieves a hunter-green baseball cap. He locks up the apartment.

Behind the wheel of the Explorer, he familiarizes himself with the dashboard. He doesn’t want to make a stupid driving mistake on the freeway and attract the attention of the cops.

He pulls out, hops on the freeway, and heads to I-94, toward the airport. It’s late, and the freeways are empty. Ordinarily, he would be happy, but tonight, he’s worried that it makes him stick out. Oh well. Too late to worry about that now.

He’s halfway to the airport when he sees what he’s looking for. A twenty-four-hour fast food joint. He exits and takes the service drive toward the golden arches. A block from the restaurant, he stops and retrieves one of the garbage bags. At this point, it doesn’t matter to him which bag it is. He reaches into the pocket of his jacket and retrieves a pair of sunglasses. He slides them onto his face. The bag shifts on his lap. The feel of the objects inside tell him it’s the bag with the hands—and he pulls around to the dumpster behind the McDonald’s. He can see the dumpster’s lids folded back. Without slowing down, from his high perch in the Explorer, he is able to toss the bag directly into the dumpster. As he turns, he scans the top of the building and the fence near the dumpster.

No video cameras.

He repeats the process several miles down the road with the bag containing the head.

Samuel waits until he’s nearly at the airport before detouring into Ecorse, the forlorn community directly in the path of approaching jets. It’s partially rural, partially urban decay. On the outskirts of town, Samuel spies an irrigation ditch. He stops and dumps the body with a splash.

He drives back into the small town, and finds what he’s looking for: a Salvation Army, complete with a dumpster out front. He rolls up the area rug and drops it in.

Samuel goes onto the airport where he parks the Explorer in long-term parking, then takes a cab back to his apartment.

Samuel pours bleach into the tub and scrubs it with an abrasive pad, then does the same to the floor and the kitchen sink. He tosses in the butcher knife, the cutting board, and the carving knife, scrubbing them until his hands and forearms are raw.

When that’s done, he carefully dries everything and returns the knives to the utility drawer.He goes back to the bathroom and showers, scrubbing his hands and arms again, vigorously rubbing shampoo into his scalp.

It’s time for him to go to work.