Kiss Me, Kill Me (7 page)

“Thank you. And water, please.”

A few minutes later, Dennis came in with a tray. It was almost surreal—a fake rose in a bud vase, a bowl of soup, soda crackers, a tall glass of ice water, and the
New York Post
folded neatly. Everything was placed just so.

“It smells great.” Though she was starving, the thought of eating made her ill.

He beamed. “I have to go to class. It starts at nine, and I don’t want to be late.”

“Is it really okay that I’m here?”

He nodded. “Charlie isn’t coming back until next week. And he won’t mind.”

Kirsten wasn’t so sure about that, but she didn’t argue with Dennis.

“I’ll be back after my class.” He smiled and waved as he left.

Kirsten opened the newspaper. A headline on the bottom front read:

Cinderella Strangler Strikes Again! P.13

Hands shaking, Kirsten turned to page thirteen.

Fourth victim found at abandoned Brooklyn warehouse

BROOKLYN—Early Wednesday morning the body of an unidentified female was discovered by a private security company in the weed-choked parking lot of the abandoned paper mill near Gowanus Bay
.

NYPD lead detective Victor Panetta refused comment, other than to confirm that a female between the ages of 18 and 25 was found at dawn Wednesday and that the investigation was his top priority
.

However, sources in the NYPD report that the crime scene matches three previous homicides. The first victim, 19-year-old Columbia University student Alanna Andrews, was discovered at a Haunted House set up in an abandoned apartment building in Harlem in the early morning hours of October 31. Erica Ripley, 21, an employee at a Java Central, was alleged to be the Cinderella Strangler’s second victim. She was found on January 2 on the south side of the Bronx, in a field near an abandoned factory. And the third victim was identified as third-year NYU student Heather Garcia, 20, killed on
February 5 at a party in Manhattanville. Her body was discovered next to a dumpster by sanitation workers. All four victims were found after attending an illegal “underground” party at an abandoned site
.

The Cinderella Strangler suffocates his victims and takes one of their shoes. Authorities refuse to comment on what the shoe may represent, but psychiatrist Emile DeFelice said the killer may have a foot fetish, or use the shoe in a bizarre sex ritual. Some experts claim that serial killers take personal effects—usually panties or jewelry—from the victim as a so-called souvenir, in order to relive their crime at a later date
.

The FBI has created a task force with NYPD and the NY Port Authority, suggesting that they are, in fact, tracking a serial killer
.

Those close to the investigation say the task force has no leads. The FBI has sent a communication to all local colleges to raise awareness among students to be extra cautious when attending a rave. Authorities are looking for new ways to put a stop to the illegal parties. Community activists advise caution when attending any event. “Go with someone you know, and leave with someone you know,” said a regular partygoer who asked to remain anonymous. “Have fun, but be smart.
”

Police are asking that anyone with information that may help them in their investigation call the task force hotline number. A $10,000 reward is offered by the FBI for any information leading to the conviction of the killer
.

Kirsten pushed the tray aside. Jessie had been murdered by a
serial killer?

Girls like you …

Kirsten didn’t know what to do. No one knew where she was.

She looked at the date on the paper. Thursday? It was already
Thursday?
She’d been sick for five days? She had to call her mother, let her know she was okay. The weekends were one thing, but she’d left home Friday night and now her mother must be frantic.

But what could she do? She couldn’t crawl around the city. She needed someone she could trust, but she had no one.

Except …

Trey would help her, she knew it. Her ex was still furious about the video, but they were talking again, and he’d told her that if she ever needed anything to just ask.

She saw a phone charger in the bedroom, but no phone. What if the owner had only a cell phone?

She crawled out of the bedroom and realized she hadn’t been outside the room since she’d arrived. The view of New York City from the picture windows took her breath away. She sat on the floor and looked around.

If she’d thought the bedroom was nice, the living room was gorgeous. Plush gray carpeting; dark-gray leather furniture; glass tables and splashes of blues and greens in paintings and throw rugs. This guy, Dennis’s brother, had to be rich.

She saw double doors across the room and made her way over, the effort depleting her energy. She was dizzy and tired.

The double doors led to a den. On the desk was an Apple computer.

“Thank you,” she whispered and crawled into the room.

She pulled herself up onto a chair. While she didn’t have Charlie’s password, she could access the guest account, and was able to get on the Internet.

She logged on to her Facebook page and was about to send Trey a message when she realized she didn’t know where she was. She needed to search Charlie’s office and find an address, anything, but she could barely see, as if everything on the periphery was black and she saw only what was directly in front of her.

She typed Trey a message and hoped it made sense. She didn’t know if she had the strength to crawl back to bed, but she had to try. She needed to sleep.

Don’t you dare, bitch …

SEVEN

At nine a.m. Thursday, Suzanne met Detective Panetta at the Starbucks around the corner from the apartment of their Jane Doe, identified this morning as Jessica Bell. “Light, no sugar,” Panetta said and handed Suzanne her coffee.

She didn’t hide her surprise. “After all these years, you remembered?”

He grinned. “My ironclad memory keeps my wife happy.”

They walked down West 112th Street, St. John the Divine Cathedral at the far cross street. It was a nice, clean neighborhood lined with apartment buildings of various ages, many filled with college students from nearby Columbia University. The wind had died down, but it had been drizzling on and off all morning.

“Did you see the
Post?
” she asked.

“Couldn’t miss it.”

“They make us look like idiots.”

“You got to ignore them.”

“It’s hard to ignore a front-page headline.”

Suzanne resented the media because they’d fucked up one of her cases a few years back. She pushed aside her frustration and changed the subject.

“So you ID’d the victim fast.”

“Had it by last night,” Panetta said. “She was reported missing by her roommate Monday morning, so we did a photo ID, then had the university send her prints in for confirmation. The coroner confirms that Jessica Bell was dead at least forty-eight hours before her body was found. It’ll be hard to get a specific time of death.”

“A range?”

“Not longer than a week, more than forty-eight hours. They’re performing some advanced tests that could possibly narrow it further, but those results won’t be overnight.”

“That’s good enough for now; we’ll be able to establish when her roommate last saw her and go from there. Chances are that she was at that party and died Saturday night.” Suzanne sipped her coffee as she walked. “She didn’t go to that party alone.”

“You don’t know that for a fact.”

“College kids may be idiots with their wild parties and drinking and drugs; they may leave with people they don’t know. But going
to
the party? Girls don’t go alone. Maybe guys do, but not girls. Or they meet up with someone when they get there.”

“Point taken.”

“So why didn’t one of her friends say something? Or look for her? Go to the police department and say,
Hey, I was at a party with my friend Jessica and she disappeared.
” Panetta opened his mouth to respond, but Suzanne answered her own question. “Because they’d be busted. Trespassing. Drunk and disorderly. Vandalism. Underage drinking. Possession of drugs. Whatever it was they were into, it was illegal. But more likely a misdemeanor, and we’d be on the case faster, talk to people faster, track down a witness, and maybe have a fucking clue who this bastard is.”

Panetta stopped walking and looked at her feet.

She glanced over her shoulder. “What’s wrong?”

“Just looking at the soapbox you’re standing on.”

She grinned and shook her head. “Okay, I know, it’s a sore spot for me.” They continued walking. “But you have kids, right?”

“Three daughters.”

“What would they do?”

“Call me.”

“You sure?”

Panetta nodded. “My oldest has never been in any serious trouble, but the other two have called me several times over the years to pick them up from a party where things got out of hand. I told them they’d rather be grounded than dead, and they agreed.” He sighed. “My youngest is graduating from high school in June. She’s deciding between Boston U and Georgetown.”

“Two great schools,” Suzanne said, impressed. “I was a Terrier.”

“How’d you like Boston?”

She shrugged. “I like Manhattan more.” She’d hated Boston, partly because she’d felt sorely out of place there, a conservative small-town Southern girl going to an urbane, big-city university. It was perhaps ironic, she’d ended up falling in love with New York City after the FBI assigned her here when she graduated from Quantico ten years ago. Now she didn’t want to leave. She’d turned down a promotion last year because she would have had to move to Montana. New York was cold enough. She’d have been a supervisory special agent in the Helena regional office—a smaller office, different crimes, and in the middle of nowhere. The incremental increase in pay wasn’t enough for her to give up fieldwork, and sitting behind a desk issuing orders wasn’t her style.

Besides, she’d grown up in the middle-of-nowhere South; she wasn’t working in the middle-of-nowhere North.

They stopped in front of Jessica Bell’s seven-story apartment building. At one time, the building had been comprised of large one- and two-bedroom apartments; most had been divided and the place was now more like an off-campus studio dormitory than individual apartments.

Jessica Bell’s roommate, Lauren Madrid, appeared shell-shocked when she opened the door and faced Suzanne and Detective Panetta. Lauren was a young, attractive, light-skinned Hispanic—a little on the skinny side maybe, thought Suzanne.

“You’re here about Jessie.”

“May we come in?” Suzanne asked.

Lauren opened the door wider and Suzanne stepped inside. There were two rooms: a small living area with a kitchen, and a bedroom that they shared. Two twin beds on opposite walls could be seen through the open double doors.

Panetta closed the door when Lauren walked to the worn couch and sat down cross-legged. “She’s really dead.”

“Yes,” Suzanne said, taking a seat next to her. “We have some questions, and for us to catch Jessica’s killer, it’s critically important that you be completely honest with us.”

Lauren looked at her quizzically. “Well, yeah, of course.”

“When was the last time you saw your roommate?”

“She was here Friday morning when I left for my classes. After that I caught a train to Albany, where my parents live. I didn’t come home until Sunday night.”

“And Jessie wasn’t here?”

“No, but I didn’t think too much about it, really. I mean, she often stays with her boyfriends.”

“Boyfriends? Plural?”

“Well, whoever she’s seeing at the time. She didn’t like to get attached to anyone. Jessica was kind of wild, but really super nice. My dad has a hard time just paying my tuition, and Jessica took care of November and December rent for me. She didn’t take my money when I tried to pay it in January.”

“Is Jessica from a wealthy family?” Suzanne asked, though these were hardly luxury accommodations.

Lauren shrugged. “I guess. I don’t know.”

“Did she have a job?”

“No.”

“How long have you known Jessica?”

“Since August. This is my first year, her second. She advertised for a roommate, and we hit it off.”

“Did you socialize together?”

“Not really.”

Suzanne didn’t understand how someone who advertised for a roommate could so easily cover said roommate’s rent for two months and not want to be repaid.

Panetta asked, “Do you know Jessica’s friends? Does she have a boyfriend? Or an ex-boyfriend?”

“Um,” Lauren frowned.

“She had no friends?” Suzanne asked, surprised.

“No, but I don’t really know her friends well. She didn’t really have a lot of people over here. Oh, there’s Josh.”

“Boyfriend?”

“Not really, they were more friends with benefits. You know, they had sex but—”

Suzanne cut her off. “I know what friends with benefits means.” All too well. “And Josh is a student? Teacher?”

“He’s a senior, I think. He lives upstairs, in seven-ten.”

After searching Jessica Bell’s room and not finding anything useful except an address book and laptop computer—which Suzanne took and gave Lauren a receipt for—they trudged up the three flights to Josh Haynes’s apartment.

“Friends with benefits,” Panetta grumbled. “I’m not a prude, but to me, sex without love and respect is meaningless.”

Maybe, but not always, thought Suzanne. And sometimes, there was affection and respect without love. And why shouldn’t she have a guy to expend sexual energy with? She answered her own question. Because there was a double standard, even at the age of thirty-three. Guys could sleep around, but girls—not so much.

After reaching the top-floor hallway, Panetta rapped on Josh Haynes’s door. He answered wearing gray sweats and no shirt.

They showed their badges. “We’re here about Jessica Bell,” Panetta said.

“Is something wrong?”

He seemed concerned, but Suzanne had faced some great criminal actors over the years. Maybe in prison they could brush up on their Shakespeare.

“When was the last time you saw or spoke with Jessica?” Panetta asked.

Josh frowned. “Saturday.”

When he didn’t offer any more detail, Suzanne prompted, “Did you have a date?”

“We went to a party on Saturday.”

“Where was the party?”

“Brooklyn. I went with her because she was nervous about riding the subway at night, but we didn’t hang out. She said she had plans.”

“I was under the impression you and Jessie were involved,” Suzanne said.

“We weren’t dating or anything like that.”

“Her roommate said you were sleeping together.”

“Well, yeah, sometimes, but we weren’t exclusive or anything. We just liked hanging together.”

“So you went to this party in Brooklyn. At a vacant warehouse?”

“Is that what this is about? The warehouse? It was just a party.”

“Jessica is dead.” Panetta was blunt.

Josh blanched. “What?”

“Her body was found fifty yards from the main entrance to the warehouse,” Suzanne said.

He shook his head. “But—I—don’t—” He stopped, confused, and stepped back.

Suzanne took that as an invitation to enter, and Josh didn’t stop them.

Panetta’s voice was harsh. “You went to a party with your good friend Jessica, didn’t leave with her, and didn’t bother to check in with her on Sunday? Or Monday morning?”

“We weren’t dating—I don’t understand. She’s not dead.”

“We have a positive ID,” Suzanne said, closing the door behind her.

Josh sat down heavily on the couch. He lived in a large one-room apartment, about five hundred square feet in the corner of the building, with four, tall narrow windows looking out onto the street. The custom woodwork that may have been original to the building had been well maintained by tenants or landlord.

“I’m just—stunned. Jess.”

Panetta said, “We’re not here about the illegal party. We’re here about a murder.”

“She was murdered?” Josh asked, as if that, too, was a revelation.

Suzanne trusted her instincts, and she didn’t see Josh as a killer, though most killers didn’t look the part.

“Mr. Haynes, we’re trying to catch Jessica’s killer. We want to talk to anyone she may have seen at the party. Our investigators tell us that at least five hundred people were at the Sunset Park warehouse. You’re telling us it was Saturday night, correct?”

Josh nodded. “It was more like eight hundred people at the peak,” he added.

“You and Jessica arrived at what time?”

“Just after midnight.”

“When was the last time you saw her?”

“Right after we got there. Jess loved to dance. That’s why she went to the parties, for the great bands. Everyone can just be themselves. I was doing my own thing.”

“Which was?”

He shrugged. “Stuff.”

“How did you find out about the party? Did you get an invitation? Read about it on the Internet? I’m a little rusty in this area.”

Suzanne suppressed a smile. Vic Panetta knew more than most fifty-year-old detectives about how the college set operated.

Josh was reticent, and Panetta gently pushed. “I understand you’re worried because that party was illegal, but I can tell you that unless you killed Jessica Bell, or are covering up for whoever did, I’m not going to arrest you for anything you did at the party. I’m a homicide detective, not a narc. But if you don’t help us, I will send your name to the detective in charge of narcotics and gangs and he’ll make your life hell.”

Josh frowned. “I am kind of involved in organizing some of the parties. But I’m not the only one,” he quickly added.

“I’m aware of that.”

“We have a website. We don’t post the location until two hours before. Only people we know have the password, and they get out the word in their circles, who pass it along. It’s mostly college kids and working types who need to blow off steam. Live music, a little drinking and drugs, just fun.”

A little drinking and drugs?
Suzanne refrained from climbing onto her soapbox again.

“So you don’t know everyone who’s there?”

“Personally, no, of course not.”

Panetta slid over a piece of paper. “These are the other three party locations where a young woman was killed during a secret party. Were any of these your parties?”

Josh looked at the paper. Then he sighed in what sounded like relief. “Only the party in the Bronx, at the factory. My group only has them in warehouses and factories.”

“Do you know who organized the other two parties?”

“Manhattanville—the one right near the university. I heard it was a frat party, not very big, maybe two hundred people. Broke up early. The one in Harlem, can’t say. But there’s one person who knows more about secret parties than anyone in the city. Wade Barnett.”

Panetta leaned back, recognition crossing his expression. Suzanne didn’t know the guy.

“Did Jessica tell you about any threats she may have received?” Suzanne asked. “Maybe a regular at the parties she attended who paid her too much attention?”

“No. But—” He hesitated.

“Go ahead,” Suzanne prompted.

“She seemed kind of jumpy lately. I don’t know why, but she didn’t say anything to me about it.”

“Would she have confided in her roommate?”

“Lauren?” he asked. “No—Lauren didn’t approve of the parties, didn’t like it when Jess came back wasted.”

“Was there anyone Jessica would have confided in? Maybe a friend, a co-worker, or someone at the college?”

Josh said, “She was close to this girl who was from out of town. Ashleigh. I don’t know her last name, only met her once or twice. A month ago, maybe longer, she stayed at Jess’s place when Lauren went home to visit her parents.”