Guilty as Sin (20 page)

Thirteen days after her disappearance, Ellie Cantrell’s body had been found in a shallow grave in a wooded area less than five miles from her house. The cause of death, Kate read, her eyes burning with unshed tears, appeared to be blunt force trauma to the head and face, though final determination would be known after the autopsy.

She’d been beaten to death.

Kate clicked back to the results page and then followed the links through to half a dozen follow-up articles. The medical examiner’s report revealed that she’d also been sexually assaulted. Though it came as no surprise, it nauseated Kate nonetheless.

But even more interesting were the reports that authorities believed Ellie’s case was connected to at least three others in Colorado, Utah, and Montana. Kate pulled up all of the information they could find on the man the press had dubbed the Bludgeoner.

All were pretty girls between the ages of fourteen and seventeen. All were good students who enjoyed active social lives but weren’t described as partiers. Not the kind of girls to put themselves in risky situations.

No arrest was ever made, but the FBI did question Arthur Dorsey of Ogden, Utah. Two days after he was taken in for questioning, Dorsey hanged himself. When they found a baseball bat with traces of blood matching one of the victims among Dorsey’s personal possessions, the FBI quickly concluded he was responsible for the murders.

The strongest evidence was that no cases with similar patterns were flagged after his death.

Dorsey was described as a loner who, despite the fact that he was well educated, had no permanent residence. He worked as a carpenter and a handyman, moving from place to place as the mood struck him.

He’d been placed in all of the victims’ cities near the time of their abductions and deaths.

Kate’s stomach knotted as she read how it was believed Dorsey targeted his victims and stalked them for several days, even weeks, before he took them. Learning their patterns, finding out where they went, when they were likely to be alone and vulnerable.

Just as Tricia’s stalker had monitored her.

Dorsey was dead. But that knowledge didn’t stop the hairs on the back of her neck from prickling or the warning twist in her gut that told her she needed to pay very close attention to this.

Kate grabbed her phone and without thinking dialed Tommy’s number. It didn’t even occur to her that she should call CJ first until Tommy’s curt greeting crackled across the line. “Kate.”

Kate didn’t bother with any social niceties and quickly filled Tommy in on the envelope, the news story, and the connection to the other missing girls. “All of them were murdered roughly two weeks after being taken,” she said. “He beat them to death.”

“And you think there’s a connection? It says here the guy they think did it hanged himself.” Of course Tommy had logged on and pulled up the information faster than she could speak.

“Someone obviously wants me to think so, if they left the article on my car.”

“What does CJ think?”

Kate was glad Tommy couldn’t see her cheeks flush as she admitted, “I haven’t called him yet.”

As Tommy was silent for a few seconds, Kate blurted, “Ibarra comes up before Kovac in my contact list.”

His soft grunt told her he could smell the bullshit through the phone line. “I’ll be over in ten. I’ll call CJ on the way and have him meet us.”

“Shouldn’t we go to the sheriff’s station?”

“I want to see if there’s any way we can figure out who left you that note. In the meantime, don’t handle it any more than you need to.”

Right. If the person who left the note was serious about
keeping his or her identity a secret, there weren’t likely to be any prints, but it was worth a try.

Kate hung up, and while she waited for the guys to arrive, she pulled up everything she could find on the Cantrell case.

The FBI had been brought in after Ellie Cantrell’s murder. She was the third victim, and by that time there was an unmistakable pattern: Girl is kidnapped on her way home from a normal activity in the early evening. Ten days to two weeks later, the body is found in a shallow grave close to the victim’s house.

Dorsey was questioned after it was uncovered that he’d worked on construction sites close to all four of the victims. His mother protested loudly that her son wasn’t capable of such heinous crimes, that any evidence against him was purely coincidental. She’d even gone so far as to try to sue the FBI agent in charge of the investigation for driving her son to suicide.

Despite her efforts, the media widely believed Dorsey was the killer.

The families of the victims agreed, even when another set of fingerprints was found on the bat in Dorsey’s rented room. “Investigating a dead man isn’t going to bring my daughter back,” said one father from Billings, Montana. “The monster who killed my little girl is rotting in hell. The only way I’d feel better was if I’d sent him there myself.”

But as the note on her desk caught her eye, Kate couldn’t help wondering if maybe Arthur Dorsey’s mother had been on to something.

N
ine and a half minutes after he’d hung up the phone, Tommy was knocking on Kate’s door. He called himself five thousand kinds of idiot as his skin seemed to tighten in anticipation at the sound of her footsteps approaching the door.

He couldn’t stop his breath from hitching for a split second before she opened it, as if he were bracing himself for the first sight of her of the day. And God help him if he didn’t feel a little sucker-punched as he met her anxious blue eyes as she ushered him inside.

“There’s the note.” Kate gestured to the desk. Tommy nodded, set his laptop case on the floor, and tried not to notice the creamy length of her legs stretching out from the hem of her shorts or the soft curve of her breasts pressing against the thin cotton of her long-sleeve T-shirt.

Tommy pulled a pair of latex gloves out of his pocket and walked over to examine it.

“You always carry those around?” Kate said, eyeing his hands suspiciously as he picked up the typewritten note.

He cocked an eyebrow at her, and no matter how much common sense told him not to flirt, not to tease, not to react with anything but complete indifference, he couldn’t stop himself from saying “Latex comes in handy. I always make sure I’m carrying.”

He could tell she caught his meaning from the magenta stain in her cheeks. It took a force of will to keep the smile from his face. Goddamn, he’d forgotten how much fun it was to make her blush, make her eyes drift silently to the floor. With her red-gold hair spilling over her shoulder, her cheeks pink, she didn’t look a day older than that sixteen-year-old he’d loved to tease.

She’d been so innocent then, it hadn’t taken much.

That it didn’t take much more now sent his thoughts drifting in a wholly inappropriate direction, such as wondering exactly how innocent she still was. How many lovers had she had in the past fourteen years, and did they make her skin get that rosy flush all over?

He shoved the thought away and along with it the acid burn that accompanied the thought of another man touching her, running his hands over her smooth, pale skin… “Where’s your car?” he asked, a little too gruffly, judging by the startled look she gave him.

“Out front.”

He followed her out the door and about halfway down the block where she’d parked her rental. “It was tucked under the windshield when I came out this morning.”

“You didn’t hear or see anything unusual.” It wasn’t a question. He doubted anyone else had seen anything either. The townhouses were popular rentals, being both on the lake and close to downtown, and also cheaper to rent than the larger lakeside houses. Dozens of people were in and out at all hours of the day, and anyone could have waited till Kate parked and went inside and slipped the envelope under the wiper without being remarked on.

He cursed under his breath, kicking himself for not trying harder to convince the owners to install security cameras. Two years ago Tommy had installed a new alarm
system across all the units after several homes nearby had been broken into. But the owner had balked at the cost of a state-of-the-art video surveillance system, and Tommy hadn’t been able to get him to budge.

All it would have taken was one street-facing camera, and they might be able to see who was passing Kate the information. But unless that person made him- or herself known, his identity would remain a mystery. Along with the motivation for writing the note.

The skin of his shoulders pulled tight at the thought of someone watching her, tracking her moves without her knowing, of possibly leaving the note to fuck with her. He’d always had that protective instinct when it came to her. Apparently it was still there, no matter how many years had passed or how much damage they’d managed to do to each other.

They went back upstairs and Kate showed him all the material she’d found online about the cases.

Tommy scanned through several articles. “You realize someone could just be doing this to mess with you.”

Kate nodded. “Of course. But something in my gut is telling me we need to pay attention to it.” Tommy nodded and took his own laptop out of his bag. He was damned familiar with the feeling, and most of the times he’d gotten in trouble was when he’d ignored it.

Except, he reminded himself, for the summer when his gut convinced him that beautiful, innocent, too-young-for-him Kate was the only girl in the world for him.

So much for his gut, but he had to agree that the Bludgeoner case begged for more investigation.

By the time CJ showed up with his own stack of papers, Tommy had managed to access information from the state and local law enforcement systems where the victims had lived and also had a copy of Dorsey’s interrogation transcript
and the report from the medical examiner who’d done his autopsy.

“You got the files?” Kate asked, her voice eager as CJ put his papers in the middle of the small dining table.

“This is what they could send electronically,” CJ said. “The rest will have to be pulled and sent hard copy. And there’s no guarantee we’ll get all of it.”

“I’m just glad you still have enough friends in the Bureau to have access to this,” Tommy said. “I may be the best, but hacking into the FBI’s files is something I like to save for only the most special occasions.”

Kate gave a little snort but didn’t say anything.

“I don’t think my limited influence would get you very far if you got caught,” CJ said. “I had to call in most of my favors just to access these files, and to be honest, I’m not convinced it was worth it. Tying Tricia’s disappearance to a serial case closed ten years ago just doesn’t make sense.”

“It made sense to whoever left me that note,” Kate pointed out.

“Any whack job with access to a computer and a printer can leave you a note,” CJ retorted.

“Well, on the bright side,” Tommy broke in, “if it is the same guy who has Tricia, and he’s holding to his pattern, we probably have an entire week until he snaps and beats her to death.”

They pulled out chairs around the dining table and started sifting through the files, searching for any kernel of information that might link these cases to Tricia’s.

“It says here that there was some argument over whether Dorsey committed suicide,” Tommy said as he read through the medical examiner’s report. “One of the assistant medical examiners questioned whether the abrasions on Dorsey’s neck were consistent with the type of rope he used.”

“Did he suspect foul play?” CJ asked.

“All it says here is that the assistant thought it was worth additional investigation. Who knows? Maybe the real killer set Dorsey up to take the fall and faked his suicide.”

“That sounds a little far-fetched,” CJ said.

“Oh, trust me. Stranger things have happened. Remember my friend Sean?”

Kate half listened to their conversation as she pored over the pages. She was at once nauseated yet unable to look away.
You have to keep it together
, she kept reminding herself.
You deal with this kind of thing every day. You’re strong. Stuff like this doesn’t shock you anymore.

Yet as she read paragraph after paragraph of the injuries inflicted on Stephanie Adler, the girl thought to be the Bludgeoner’s second victim, she couldn’t keep the horror at bay. Couldn’t imagine how terrifying and unbearably painful the last minutes of her life must have been.

How excruciating it was for her parents to learn that their child was not only dead but that she’d died an agonizing death.

She swallowed hard and flipped the page, only to lock eyes on a picture that sent her hurtling over the edge. It was a close-up picture of Stephanie’s face, so battered her parents had to identify her by a unique birthmark on her right thigh. Her skin was a cold gray where it wasn’t mottled with dark bruises. Her nose, once small and turned up at the tip, had been broken so badly it looked like a blob of clay stuck to her skin. Her cheekbones had been crushed. Finger-shape bruises ringed her throat, but that wasn’t what killed her.

The medical examiner had determined that the cause of death was from repeated blows to her face and head with a heavy object, eventually damaging her brain so badly that her frontal lobe had been virtually turned to soup.