Requite (19 page)

“Thanks Captain.”

I hung up.

An empty plate and fork sat on the desk of the room, next to it, five empty bottles of vodka. He had just finished booking his flight to Indonesia. It was a last minute selection. While Canada would have been OK, Tom decided he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life in the cold. Indonesia’s climate wasn’t too far off from Florida’s. The islands provide endless beaches and his money would go much further. The flight there had two layovers and the total travel time was thirty-plus hours. The first layover was in Chicago, after that, he would never step foot in the United States again. His flight departed at 7:40 p.m.

Tom wadded up the sheet with the bloody sweater and clothes he had on earlier. He peered through the peephole of the hotel room’s front door. As far as he could see, no one was in the hallway. He opened the door and looked left to right. A maid cart sat a few doors down. He flipped the door guard latch out to prop the door open and walked down the hall toward the cart. The maid attended to the room inside. Tom crept past. He looked into the room. The maid was wearing headphones and vacuuming. Tom buried the soiled clothes and sheet in the bottom of her hamper. He covered them with the rest of the dirty linens and started back to his room.

“Sir. Did you need something?” a woman’s voice asked.

Tom turned to see the maid standing next to her cart in the hall.

“I was just looking for some towels. We seem to be all out of clean ones. Do you have any on the cart?”

“Sure. I have some right here. How many did you need?”

“Two would be great. Thanks.”

Tom walked back to the maid at the cart. She handed him a pair of towels. He did his best to reach out with both hands and take them. The painkillers and vodka were doing their job to dull the pain.

“There you go, Sir. Does your room need service?”

“I think I’ll be good with just the towels. Thanks.”

Tom carried the towels back to his room. As he approached he could hear the telephone ringing from inside. He rushed in and flipped the latch back, allowing the room door to close. He dropped the towels on the floor and picked up the receiver.

“Hello?”

“Hello Sir, this is James with Prestige Limo. We have arrived out front. Do you need a hand with your bags?”

“No. I’ll be down in a few minutes.”

“We’ll be waiting for you right out front, Sir.”

“Thank you.”

Tom hung up the phone and scooped up the pillow case from the floor. The makeshift bag jingled from the mini bottles inside—he’d cleared the fridge. He checked the room to make sure he didn’t forget anything. Tom walked out and headed down the hall. He opted for the stairs. Whatever pain was involved making the journey down the eight flights was less than the pain of being trapped in the elevator with tourists. He made a right by the ice machine and used his foot to kick the door for the stairwell open. He questioned his decision to not ride the elevator half way down. The last four flights were torture. He hit the bottom of the stairwell and untied the pillowcase bag. His hand grasped a mini bottle of gin. He cracked the top and drank it down. The bottle was dropped at his feet as he pushed the door open. The lobby was filled with people—old couples on vacation, families waiting in line for the hotel’s restaurant, hotel staff buzzing about.

As Tom made for the front he saw a cop standing to the side of the sliding doors. He kept his head low as he passed. The straw hat did it’s best to conceal Tom’s identity. The doors parted as he approached. He looked out of the doors searching for the Town Car—it took his eyes a few seconds to adjust to the light. He spotted the car parked to the right of the door about thirty feet away. Beyond the Town Car, he watched two squad cars pass out front on the street. He walked to the car.

The limo driver leaned on the side—a tall thin man in his forties dressed in a black suit with a white undershirt.

“Mister Taylor?”

A squad car with lights flashing sped past on the street.

“Are you Mister Taylor?” the driver asked again.

“Sorry. Yes.”

“I’ll be your driver today, Sir. Brad Smith.”

“Hello, Brad.”

The driver pointed to the pillowcase filled with mini bottles. “Bag in the trunk?”

“No, that’s fine. I’ll keep it with me.”

Brad nodded. He walked to the back door of the Lincoln and opened it, allowing Tom inside. He closed him in. Tom scooted forward in the seat watching the street through the tinted glass of the car. Brad opened the driver’s door and took his seat behind the wheel.

“Heading to the airport correct?”

“That is correct.”

Tom wondered if they were heading to the judge’s house.

“It should be about a twenty-five minute ride or so, depending on traffic.”

“Yeah, that’s fine.”

Tom’s voice trailed off. His attention was focused on the street. As the Town Car pulled from the parking lot another police cruiser flew by. His driver turned right from the resort’s parking lot. Tom stared out of the back window watching the police car make a left into the judge’s cul-de-sac.

How the hell did they find Casey so fast?

“Time of death Ed?” I asked.

The judge’s body lay covered on a rolling gurney. Ed stood behind it to push it from the living room.

“Eight to ten hours. Somewhere right in there. Lividity is fixed.”

I looked at my watch. Casey would have been killed between midnight and two in the morning.

“What time did Santos say the judge got home?”

“Right around midnight.”

“Spearman could have been here waiting for him.”

Captain Bostok and I watched the Ed wheel the judge’s body from the living room, down the front step, and out to the driveway where his van was parked.

Rick approached with the tire iron in a large, see through evidence bag.

“No one touched this did they?” Rick asked.

The couple officers still inside the house shook their heads.

“I haven’t touched it,” the captain said.

“No. Not that I saw,” I said.

“We got prints all over this thing.”

Pax walked out from the bathroom, evidence bags in hand.

“I pulled prints from the bathroom too. Have one in blood on the side of the sink. The two shirts that were lying on the bathroom floor tell a story. Bullet holes through the left shoulders,” Pax said.

“So Spearman was shot by Casey? Where’s that gun?”

“Have it sealed up in an evidence bag.” Rick jerked his head toward the dining room table. “It’s in that tote over there.”

“Casey’s gun?” Bostok asked.

“Have to get the prints from it and run the numbers.”

“What’s the scene telling you, Rick?” I asked.

“Looks pretty simple. Here, follow me.”

We trailed behind Rick to the laundry room.

“Suspect waited behind that door for Casey to walk in from the garage. As soon as he did, he struck him with the tire iron and Casey went down. We have a number of bullet holes in the walls here. The holes all travel upward, so our shooter, Casey, fired from a seated position. I checked the gun, all six shots were fired. This mark of blood here.” Rick pointed to a small puddle behind the door. “Pretty sure that is a result of our guy getting shot.”

“Gun versus tire iron and gun loses?” I asked.

“He had already been hit with the tire iron once. My guess is a flurry of shots at a moving target from someone inexperienced with a firearm. Combine that with severe head trauma.”

“And alcohol,” I said.

“Alcohol?” Rick asked.

“We got word that the judge had been drinking. Anyway, continue.”

“When the six shots were gone, it was over. From first glance at the body, it looked like he took a number of strikes. After that the body was moved out to the living room.”

“Why?” I asked.

“I can’t answer that one for you, Lieutenant,” Rick said.

“So he’d be found by anyone who looked into the house. Spearman wanted him found right away. Let’s get the kid back to the station with all this and get going on it. Get confirmation on all the prints,” the captain said.

Captain Bostok motioned to get the evidence loaded up. Rick and Pax each carried a tote outside.

“Thanks Rick,” I said.

I followed Pax and Rick from the house outside to Casey’s driveway where Hank and Captain Clark stood talking next to the coroner’s van.

I walked over. Clark excused himself for an incoming phone call.

“I was just filling him in on what we found. What’s our next move?” Hank asked.

“I’m not sure we have one. His message is complete.
Justice for murdering Claire Spearman
. I doubt we’ll get another body.”

“So what do we do?”

“Well, Faust put an alert out on Spearman through the FBI’s database. All we can do is follow up on any leads that get called in.”

“There’s Jake,” Hank said.

I hadn’t thought about it, but Hank was right. He might be able to tell us something, if he ever came around.

“You didn’t hear anything about a change in his condition did you?” I asked.

“No.”

A question was rattling around in my head. Something that just popped in. “You think Spearman knows that Jake is still alive?”

“I don’t know, why?”

“Well, he’s killed everyone else he’s gone after. These are revenge killings. He’s extracting his revenge for whatever allegedly happened to his wife. He’s been bludgeoning people to death and carving messages in their head. His message is complete except one of the people isn’t dead. By the severity of these attacks, Spearman doesn’t come across like someone who would leave a victim alive to me.”

I went quiet. I was working on an idea.

“You got the wheels turning. What’s up?” Hank asked.

“I need to go talk to the captain.”

“Fill me in.”

I headed back into the house and gave Hank a wave to follow. “Come on.”

I found Bostok standing in the kitchen.

“Cap, I need to run something by you.”

“I’m listening.”

“You spoke with Jake’s father on the phone, right?”

“Yeah. Roger Richwood.”

“How did he seem?”

“He seemed like he wanted to bring whoever did this to his son to justice.”

“Think he’d be willing to help with something?”

“What did you have in mind?”

I laid out my plan for the captain. It was a long shot, but it may work. The captain agreed. I just needed to try to convince Jake’s parents to help. I grabbed Roger Richwood’s phone number from my notepad and dialed.

“Hello?”

“Mister Richwood?”

“Yes.”

“This is Lieutenant Carl Kane with the TPD. You spoke with my captain earlier.”

“Yes. Have you found Spearman?”

“Not yet. We are doing everything in our power to find him. We think that you might be able to help.”

“How?”

“Before I get into that, how is your son? Has there been in progress in Jake’s state?”

“The doctors say he is doing better, but he’s still unconscious. Doctor Wallace says that he should begin to come around soon.”

“That’s good news.”

“We could use some. It’s hard seeing your flesh and blood like that. You said something about helping. How?”

“I want to set up a press conference with you and your wife asking the public to help find the man who did this.”

“I don’t know if I want to put my wife through that, Lieutenant. It looks like this guy is getting plenty of press as it is. His face is all over the television. It was on the paper that I grabbed this morning. It’s everywhere already.”

“We know that, but this isn’t for the public.”

“I don’t understand.”

I laid it out for him—every last detail. He was hesitant. I told him the precautionary steps that we’d take and he began to come around. He talked it over with his wife. They agreed to help.

I put the wheels in motion and called up Sam James to schedule us a press conference at the hospital. We needed to get every media outlet there to broadcast. The sooner it could be arranged, the better.

Bostok made a call back to the station to get me the men I needed. We left the judge’s house and drove for the hospital.

Tom sat in the main hub of the airport prior to any check of an identification or pass through security. He took a booth toward the back of the T.G.I. Friday’s restaurant. He had a beer sitting on a coaster in front of him. At the booth beside him was his pillowcase filled with mini bottles of booze. His face was buried in a menu. He couldn’t decide what he wanted to eat. His layover in Chicago was only forty minutes. There wouldn’t be time to have a meal. This could be the last thing he ate in the U.S. and he wanted to make it count. The food in Indonesia would take some getting used to. The back of the menu had a lunch deal for a fourteen ounce steak and mashed potatoes—he was torn between that and a good old fashioned cheeseburger.

His waitress approached. “You all set?” she asked.

“Think I’ll go with the steak that’s on special here.” Tom tapped at the photo on the menu.

“Good choice. How did you want that cooked?”

“Rare.”

“OK. Did you need something more to drink? We have a few drinks that are on the lunch menu as well.”

“Another beer.”

“No problem, should be just a few minutes on the food and I’ll bring your beer right back out for you.”

Tom folded the menu back up and slid it between the condiments on the table.

He spent the next ten minutes sipping his beer and going over the details on his brother’s passport so they were fresh in his head. His address, date of birth and social security number all had to flow out without a hitch if he came under questioning. The height and weight were close enough to not have to worry about.

“Where you headed?” the waitress asked.

Tom folded the passport closed and slipped it back in his pocket. “Off to see the world. Starting in Asia.”

“Wow that sounds like fun. Well, safe travels.”

“Thanks.”

“OK, here’s the steak and some utensils. Need anything else?”

Tom looked at the steak in front of him. A trickle of red juice flowed from the thick slab of meat and soaked into the nearby onions.