Daddy's Home (13 page)

“Okay.” Maureen headed back to her desk.

Holly truly felt like they were on the brink of breaking this case. She headed for Brooke’s office.

Dr. Brooke Madison sat behind her glass-top desk, peering over her eyeglasses, more than likely a designer brand, looking intently at whatever it was she was reading. She didn’t look up as Holly came in. The sight of Brooke, ever the model of elegance and grace, never failed to amaze Holly.

Her modern office reflected her style and subtle taste, managing to look as if a human being worked there even when surrounded by the clutter and mess of the other precinct offices.

Her shiny blonde hair (that Holly knew never went beyond four weeks without a touch up) was cut into a shoulder-length bob, and her crystal blue eyes shone brightly as if she were always on top of the world. Right. Holly knew what (or at least who) she was busy on top of these days.

Holly cleared her throat. Brooke looked up at her. “Must be some interesting reading there.”

“Well, hello, Detective.” Brooke removed her glasses. “I can only guess what has brought you to see me.”

“I suppose you can.”

“The ‘Family Man.’”

Holly cringed at the title, but once the media named the murderer, it had stuck. Even the precinct staff was calling him that. “I’d prefer to call him something else.”

“I’m certain you would. I’ve got some theories about him, and I think I might be able to help you come up with a profile.”

“I am here for that exact reason, Doctor. We may actually have a suspect, but up to now, we haven’t located him. Once we do, and we confirm he is the murderer, I’d like to know exactly who it is I’m dealing with. What are you thinking?”

“First, don’t expect this one to slow down anytime soon. If you don’t locate your suspect, or if he’s the wrong man, he will continue to hunt and kill.”

“I was afraid that you might say that.”

“And I don’t say it necessarily because I think he truly likes to kill and revel in his kill the way that so many psychotics and psychopaths do. No, there’s more to this person than that. He’s rather complicated, I’d say. I read your report about the possibility of his considering himself the father in these cases. I also had a good look at his letter. Very interesting. Quite an ego on this one.”

“Great. So now tell me what you’re thinking about this loser.”

“Like I said, it’s not about the killing. He’s got a romantic fascination with family life and what that means to him. My guess is that he was terribly abused as a child.” Brooke shifted in her oversized black leather chair.

“It always starts at home, doesn’t it?”

“A good share of the time. Here’s what I think. He has been searching for the perfect family, and he does a good job finding them, stalking them, and insinuating himself into their lives for however long he needs them to play along with his fantasy. Until he determines that it’s time to kill. Based on what I’ve seen in the reports, when the assault happens, the mothers go into a fright-and-flight response. Their main objective is to save their child. I read over Dr. Lareby’s reports and noted that he found sedatives in the children. I think that he rapes the mothers while the children are drugged, and all that the mothers can think about is saving their child.”

“That would be a normal response.”

“Yes. However, it’s not working for them.”

“No kidding.” Holly sighed. “They’re all dead.”

“Once his victim, the mother, starts to fight back, his murderous rage is fueled. This path that he is on probably originates from the abuse that he suffered. My guess here is it’s likely to be his father, and—”

Holly interrupted. “Wait. Why do you think his anger is about his father when he’s victimizing women? Usually the profile would fit if his mother had beaten him. That would make him want to lash out and kill her.”

“Yes, usually. Good question. I’ll answer that in a minute. So as I was saying, once the mother fights back, his entire fantasy is destroyed. I mean the perfect daddy, or ‘best daddy,’ as he refers to himself, would not have a disobedient wife.”

“So he thinks he’s freaking Ward Cleaver and she’s June.”

“That’s one way of putting it.”

“Once he’s been disappointed, he kills them.”

“Yep. He goes straight into a rage, maybe not even realizing what he’s doing.”

“You’re not going to tell me that once we get him that he’ll be able to plead insanity?”

“It’s very possible, and if he gets himself a good attorney, it’s likely. And I think he can probably afford a good attorney.”

“What makes you say that?”

“My gut says that he’s a professional of some sort, and it’s very likely that he could afford a skilled attorney.”

“Great. So he could be a school teacher, a gym trainer, a financial planner, a lawyer, whatever.”

“Yes.”

“What about a sexual deviant?”

“That’s obvious,” Brooke replied.

“Specifically, someone who likes the S&M variety of sex?”

“I’m not convinced of that. However, as he so viciously mutilated Shannon McKay, I certainly can’t rule it out. I’ll have to finish my analysis.”

“Anything else that you might be able to tell me?”

“That’s about it for now. I’m going to go through the mothers’ and children’s profiles and cross-reference them. That might tell us the type of women he’s looking for and what they have in common. Aside from both being attractive, the victims’ physical descriptions are very different from one another.”

“He’ll probably pick another petite one like our first gal, after the way Shannon McKay tried to fight him off. Let me ask you, do you think he knows his victims, or does he do a random pick?”

“Good question. I’d have to say that he knows them in some way. It might be a very small passing moment, one with either the mother or the child. They might not even remember ever meeting or seeing him.”

“Like in passing on a street?”

“Sure. Or more likely the park, the library, places where mothers might take their children on Saturday afternoons.”

“Great. Just what I need to be worrying about, every McDonald’s and Chuck E. Cheese out there.”

“Yes, you probably do until I can get a better profile of him. And no matter where he finds them, he has to blend in and not alarm them in any way. It’s not like these mothers took measures to guard themselves. I get the sense that they were not afraid. Not at first anyway.”

“So they might have known him better than just a simple smile on the street.”

“Possibly.”

“Okay. Before I check out of here and let you off the hook for the evening, you said that you had a theory about the rage being against a father figure rather than the mother. That seems odd to me. From everything I know and learned as a prison nurse, I always thought that killers victimize the sex that they hate, usually because of some past connection to a parental figure, so that part I get. But why the father?”

“Here’s what I think about that. As I’ve said, this killer comes from an abusive home where the dad was the above all and be all, probably a real angry character. The father took out his rage on our killer, his mother, and any siblings he might have had. When his family wasn’t behaving in what he considered an appropriate way, then you can imagine. Given the way your UNSUB’s mind is warped, whatever Daddy was doing to him and his family as a kid was horrendous.”

“Are you saying that he’s playing the actual role of his father during his escapades?”

“Maybe. I’m not sure yet. I don’t know if he starts out playing as his own father and then eventually ends up as his own unique father figure symbol. But I can tell you that his father factors heavily into this.”

“Super. So all I have to do is find all of the abusive fathers in this country in over the last what? Thirty-five years?”

Brooke gave a slight, haughty laugh. “If your suspect doesn’t pan out, then yes. Not an easy task, my friend. I don’t envy you bringing this one to justice. He’s smart, but I think if he is angry enough, he might get careless, and you may get a break.”

“You think he’ll strike again if we don’t bring him in soon?”

“Did you have any doubts?” Brooke leaned forward in her chair, rolling her fists up under her chin.

“I was sort of crossing my fingers.”

“Unless this guy takes a flying leap off the Coronado Bridge or a set of gang-bangers from Logan Heights gets a hold of him, I’d say he’s going to strike again very soon. It’s too bad you can’t locate your suspect. Is it this William James character? Carpenter sent me down a file and had me take a look.”

“That would be the one,” Holly replied.

“Don’t get your hopes up too high, Holly. This James character is a real scary man, and some of it fits. But some of it doesn’t. I’m not always right, but keep your eyes on the road and look for all possibilities. I know the lab is processing James’s DNA that you brought in. If it comes back positive, then you probably have your man, and I’ll be proven wrong.”

“You have no idea how much I hope you’re wrong,” Holly replied. “No offense.”

“None taken. But James just doesn’t fit into what your UNSUB is looking for. I read that he came from a home where his folks were married for over thirty years until his mom passed away. Doesn’t sound like a man with a psychotic need for a close knit family.”

“Maybe not, but no one knows what goes on behind closed doors, and the fact that James is such a pervert and sicko leads me to think that his family didn’t compare too well with the Beaver’s.”

Brooke laughed. “True, true. Our man does indeed have an incessant need for this family that he can’t seem to find.”

Brooke put her glasses back on, uncrossed her legs, and stood, gathering her papers together and shoving them in an alligator briefcase.

“Before you go, Detective, can I ask you something?”

Holly didn’t like the sound of that. “Sure.”

“I know that you’re aware of my relationship with Chad, and I hope that you’re okay with it. I know how close you are to each other.”

Holly had never seen the always put-together doctor so uneasy. It was a bit enjoyable. “I do know, and, yes, he’s like a little brother.”

“I care a great deal for him.”

“That’s wonderful. I hope it works out,” Holly replied.

Brooke locked her briefcase. “I just wanted you to know that.”

Holly nodded. “So you’ll call me if you come up with anything else?”

“Sure will.”

As Holly left Brooke’s office, that distrust she’d felt about Chad earlier in the day resurfaced with Brooke’s words. Why was there so much concern for her feelings? What were they hiding? Or was she being paranoid? And if so, why did she feel like that about someone who she had known and trusted for years?

She rubbed her eyes and thought about how nice it would be to finally climb in bed that evening. However, as tired as she was, could she really sleep? Her partner and his girlfriend were weirding her out, not to mention that she may or may not have found her killer. If it was James, where the hell was he? And, God forbid, would he strike again before she brought him in on Monday?

CHAPTER TWELVE

Gunter poured himself a glass of crisp chardonnay and set it down on the table next to him. He walked back into his kitchen—all stainless steel and white—to take his warm bread out of the oven. This was all a part of his nightly ritual. He was a traditional man, and a romantic one at that. If a wife had been here with him, she would know that. He would rectify that soon enough. The park had not borne fruit yesterday.
C’est la vie.

He turned up his oven to 375 degrees and took out the bread, replacing it with a pan of shrimp scampi. His mother had been a good cook and a good teacher
,
but she had never shown true love and appreciation for his father. As a child, Gunter had felt so very sorry for her and had loved her with everything he possibly could.

He missed her.

Gunter sat down in his recliner and took a sip of his wine, appreciating its complex bouquet, and then reached for the newspaper. He flipped through world events and soon turned to the metro section. There it was on the first page.
The Family Man Strikes Again.
“The family man.” Now that had a nice ring to it. He went on to read the article, which was concerned quite a bit more about Shannon and Sara than himself. That wasn’t what he expected.
What a
wonderful mother Shannon had been . . . how devoted to Sara
.

Ha! If she’d been so fucking devoted, the kid would still be alive and they would still be a family.

It hurt his heart, though, to read about Sara and how wonderful she was. He felt his face burn at the thought of what Shannon had made him do to them.

“Bitch,” he muttered.

As he continued reading the story, something else caught his eye even more than their off-base psychoanalysis of who he was—because Gunter was as sane as the rest of the men in America. In fact, probably more so. Definitely more so. At least he was trying to be a good daddy—the best daddy. What about all of the dead beats out there? He was a responsible man. What about all those men who up and leave their wives and children? That wasn’t his style. Yes, the analysis of him offered by the media and the police was off base, and the woman detective behind the investigation . . . Who was she, this Detective Holly Jennings? Holly Jennings. The name bothered him. Where did he know her from?
Did
he know her? “I need a wife to keep me organized. Help me remember all of the things that I forget.”

He reached the bottom of the article where it said how distraught and devastated Sara’s father was. “Well, I suppose you shouldn’t have ever left, huh, Dad?”

Gunter folded up the paper, went back into the kitchen with his wine, and finished it while waiting for the timer to go off. Tomorrow was Thanksgiving, and he didn’t have to work. He wished he did. It had been slow going this week, and he was a little pissed off about it. He really wanted another family. Desperately. He didn’t care to have his turkey day alone. Maybe he would go out and find some of his friends.