Booby Trap (5 page)

“He did what?”

The question came from Greg, who was positioned in front of our patio grill, tongs in one hand, a beer in the other, his mouth dropped to the ground. There was a lot of that happening lately. The sizzle of cooking steaks filled the silence of disbelief that followed his question.

“You heard me.” I was in the middle of shuttling place settings, condiments, and salad from the kitchen to the patio table as we talked. “Brian asked Lil to run away with him.”

“That’s sick!” Greg drained his beer and put the bottle on the table. Knowing instinctively that this was not going to be a one- beer conversation, I twisted the top off another Sam Adams and placed it within his reach.

“But Greg, he didn’t know Lil was his mother. He thought—
thinks
—she’s some hotsie-totsie sex kitten in her prime.”

I was about to say more, but our back gate opened and in trotted Wainwright, towing Silas behind him at the end of his leash. Sometimes Silas and Billy would drop by and ask to play with Wainwright. Mostly they played in our back patio area, but once in a while Greg would let the boys take Wainwright to a nearby park. Not the one at the beach, but one just a block from the house that did allow dogs. Today, only Silas had come to the door looking for doggie company. Usually our back gate is locked, but in anticipation of Silas and Wainwright’s return, Greg had left it unlatched.

“Hey, Silas,” Greg greeted him. “Did you two have fun?”

“Yeah, it was awesome. There was a puppy there. A boxer, I think, named Amos. We played with him.”

“That’s Ted and Sophie’s new dog,” Greg told him. “They live over on the next street.”

I disappeared into the kitchen and came back with the last of the menu items, a couple of piping-hot baked potatoes. I plopped one down on Greg’s plate and the other on mine.

“Want to stay for dinner, Silas?” I asked as the boy unleashed Wainwright. “We have plenty.”

The boy shook his head. “Thank you. But I have to get home. My grandma is expecting me.”

“You can call her,” Greg added as he pulled the steaks off the grill.

The boy looked at the meat with hungry eyes but shook his head again. “Thanks, but I can’t.”

I smiled at him. “Maybe another time you can plan ahead to stay and eat with us. Billy, too.” He smiled shyly back.

Silas and Billy lived with their grandmother several blocks away in a run-down two-bedroom home. Greg and I weren’t quite sure what the situation was, and the boys never talked about their parents. When they started coming to our house to play with the dog a few months ago, Greg insisted on meeting the grandmother and giving her our address and telephone number. Marylou Smith was her name, and at the time she didn’t appear to be in the best of health, but the boys were always polite, clean, and cared for.

As soon as Silas left, Greg locked the back gate. “It’s still sick,” he said, rolling to the table.

“Huh?”

“The thing with Lil and her son.”

“Yes, that. Sorry, I hadn’t switched back to that topic yet. Guess I was afraid of getting brain whiplash.”

Greg chuckled and positioned himself at the end of the table to my left. He lifted his beer in my direction. I lifted my own bottle of beer, and we clinked them together.

“Here’s to us, sweetheart. We may be crazy, but at least we’re not sick.”

I grinned at my husband. “Well, at least in our eyes we’re not.”

Working in silence, we each dressed our potatoes. Greg garnished his with butter, shredded cheddar cheese, and fresh ground pepper. I preferred butter and sour cream. But even as I prepared to dig into the fluffy, perfectly cooked innards, I couldn’t stop thinking about Lil and her online activities. I was rather glad Silas hadn’t stayed for dinner. Otherwise, Greg and I would have had to delay our conversation. Serial killers and online trysts were hardly dinner conversation for a preteen.

“Greg, I know you used to meet women online.” He looked up, curious about where I was heading. “Did you ever pretend to them about who you were?”

“You mean, did I ever lie to women about being in a wheelchair?” He paused before answering. “Yes, all the time, at least for a while.” He pushed his potato toppings around, concentrating on smooshing them deeper into the hot middle of the spud. Finally, he looked up at me. “It was difficult for me to meet women. I’m sure you realize that, Odelia.”

I nodded in understanding and gave him an encouraging smile. Greg had injured himself when he was just a few years older than Silas. It had happened while he and his cousins were performing daredevil actions while crossing a wet and rickety bridge high over a river. The other boys made it; Greg didn’t.

“At first,” Greg continued, “I told them the truth but couldn’t get anywhere. No one would meet me, except for the few hookers I stumbled across in some of the chat rooms. But I was looking for someone nice, a woman I could build a life with.” At the end of this remark, he gave me a look so electric with love that it nearly stopped my heart.

“Then I started letting the women I met online assume I was just a regular guy, hoping when they met me they would think I was so terrific, the chair wouldn’t matter.” He picked up his beer and gave a short snort before taking a drink. “But that didn’t work either. In fact, that was a total disaster.”

He’d told me a few of those painful experiences. We were both treasures—Greg in his wheelchair, me with my extra poundage—that most people weren’t willing to dig beyond the surface to discover. But in the end, we’d magically found each other.

“Finally, I got it through my skull that the type of woman I wanted, the type who’d be able to love and accept me paralyzed from the waist down, would have to be the type who wouldn’t shrink at first glance. After that, I started being very open and honest about my situation. And I did meet some wonderful women by being truthful. Maybe not as many, but while the quantity went down, the quality went up. In the end, the truth was the best route. It usually is, don’t you think?”

I thought about that as I cut a piece of steak. Greg was right. Even I had discovered that in my sketchy pre-Greg love life. Blind dates where the man was surprised by my physical appearance almost never went well, but those with an idea of the packaging beforehand took the time to get to know me.

“I totally understand why Lil did what she did, Greg, even if I don’t agree with it. But in her case, she wasn’t looking to meet the love of her life. She just wanted the fantasy of feeling young again and to hear men tell her she was desirable. Throughout history, lots of people have died searching for the fountain of youth. Brian Eddy makes a damn good living off of people searching for it in the modern age. The Internet gave Lil the chance to do that without leaving home, without taking any risks.”

Greg finished chewing before he spoke. “Perhaps she didn’t take any obvious risks, sweetheart, but now she’s in a tight spot because of it. A pickle, as you would say.”

He put down his knife and fork and picked up the pepper mill. “So,” he said, as he gave it a couple of twists over his steak, “are you going to leave me guessing about the juicy stuff?”

“Juicy stuff?”

“How did Lil finally realize she was getting nasty with her own son?”

“He came out and told her who he was. Not at first, of course. According to Lil, they had been having quite a torrid online relationship when he asked to meet her. When she declined, he told her his real name, hoping that would convince her.”

“I can’t believe she continued it.” Greg shook his head in disbelief. “Especially once she realized who he was.”

“Lil claims she cooled it down immediately—didn’t even talk online with him for a long time. But her curiosity got the better of her, as well as her desire to know more about her son, and she resumed the relationship, but on a friend-only basis. She says they haven’t talked sexually since she found out. She finally told him she was married and didn’t feel right about it, but wanted to remain friends. Lil says for the past month they’ve been more confidants than anything.”

“But if the doctor is a competitive guy and thought he was in love, that would have made him even more eager to meet her. And if his own marriage was rocky, as Lil told you, I can see why he continued pursuing her.” He paused. “But it still doesn’t make him the Blond Bomber, just a lonely, horny guy with a bad marriage.”

I took a bite of steak and chewed. “Lil said he admitted knowing a few of the dead women from the Internet. And the night the nurse disappeared, Brian stood her up on a planned online date. Lil said when she became suspicious, she dug up the dates of the last couple of murders and checked them against Brian’s schedule. Apparently, he always lets his mother know when he’s going to be out of town, and she keeps her old calendars. Each time a woman was found murdered, Dr. Brian Eddy was conveniently out of town.”

“And that wouldn’t be an alibi rather than evidence?”

“To Lil’s thinking, the trip is a cover alibi in case the police find any old e-mails and link Brian to the dead girls.”

“And that’s her evidence?”

“Yep. It’s not totally off the mark. I mean, it does seem coincidental that he would know some of the dead women and would admit that to his online lover. But then again, maybe Brian is trying to appear innocent by being forthcoming. The good doctor is either very cagey or very trusting.”

I must admit, it was rather a relief to have Greg working with me on this favor for Lil. I was enjoying brainstorming with him, like we did when our mutual friend Sophie London died. We made a great team.

During the week, Greg had dug up all the information he could on the Blond Bomber and his victims, all four of them to date. Together, we made a detailed list of any common traits and information beyond their physical appearance. I’m sure it’s the same thing the police have done, but we were starting from scratch and looking for clues to who didn’t do it, instead of who did it. To those lists, we added the information Lil had provided, including Brian’s travel data.

According to the sketchy personal information on each victim, the four ranged in age from Gabby, who was sixteen, to Crystal Lee Harper, who died at the age of fifty-three. The information led me to believe that most were active in Internet chatting. All, that is, except the last one, number four, Laurie Luke, the nurse from Newport Beach. There was no mention of the Internet possibly linking her to her killer.

The first victim had been Elaine Epps, twenty-seven, a personal assistant from Long Beach. Crystal Lee Harper was the second victim and a former exotic dancer. The third was the unfortunate Gabby.

Starting with the most recent victim, with the reasoning that the trail would be the freshest, I read every detail on Laurie Luke that Greg produced. According to the information supplied to the press by her sister, Lisa Luke, Laurie was twenty-eight, a dedicated nurse recently engaged to a professional adventure and wildlife photographer, and spent most of her free time out of doors. Based on the photos in the newspapers, Laurie Luke was not just a blond bombshell, she was a knockout. A former Miss Illinois, Laurie was the all-American girl kicked up a notch.

“Something’s troubling me.” I stopped eating for a moment and hugged myself. It was starting to get chilly. No matter how warm the April days were, evenings near the beach could be cold.

“Just something, as in singular?”

“Actually, everything about this creeps me out. The whole idea that there’s someone out there meeting women just for the purpose of killing them is beyond me. But sadly, I know it happens all the time. People are just sick.”

Greg took one of my hands in his. “I believe that generally people are good, Odelia. I agree, there are a lot of fruitcakes out there, and some individuals are absolutely evil. But overall, people are kind and good.”

“Are you sure your middle name is William and not Pollyanna?”

With a faint smile, he lifted my hand to his lips and gently kissed it. Without letting it go, he stared directly into my eyes. “This is not going to be an easy thing to look into, Odelia. The information is going to be brutal and nasty, and you may find out your friend raised a cold-hearted killer before you’re done.”

“You don’t want me to do it, do you?”

He paused before speaking. “I want you to know you can stop all this right now and no one will think less of you, probably not even Lil. And if she did, she’s not your friend. But if you do proceed, I also want you to remember I’m here to listen and to help. You’re not in it alone.” He smiled slightly. “And I also know that once you get your teeth into something, you’re like a starving dog with a soup bone—you don’t let go until you get to the very marrow. So even if you stop everything right now, it will still haunt you until you pick it up and finish the job. It’s who you are.”