Serial Separation (3 page)

Chapter 7

By the time I arrived back home it was almost 7:00 p.m. I wanted to call Lisa immediately, but I thought I might be on for a few minutes and decided to take care of nature. I was upset about calling two hours late.

I tried the dorm number, and someone answered. I told her I wanted to speak to Lisa, and I guess she just hung up the phone. I called right back and got a nasty response after the fourth ring. I thought to myself, it was so much better when she called me. I called a few minutes later and asked for Lisa. I could tell the phone was just dropped, but I did hear someone run up the stairs. I had dealt with this for months, and dreaded calling.

About five minutes later: “Hello.”

“Hi, Lisa, it’s Scott. I’m sorry I missed calling you at five.”

She didn’t immediately respond. “It’s okay, Scott. Judy and I used the time to talk. Is everything okay?”

“Yes. You know I was going to talk to Paddy about joining the new task force, and I saw him today.”

“Is that where you were? I was worried about you. I thought you might have had an accident or something. Couldn’t you have called me to let me know you were still there? Well, did you get on the task force?”

I could tell she was upset. “No. Paddy said he couldn’t make any commitment due to the AG giving him grief about my involvement the last time.”

“I’ll be off the phone in a minute.”

I could tell she was being hounded by someone wanting the phone. I knew dorms were like that, having been accustomed to the process.

She continued. “Do you have to stand beside me? I promise I’ll let you know when I’m finished. I’m sorry, Scott, you know the routine. I thought you were going to the task force office the first thing this morning?”

“I did, but—”

She interrupted me. “But you couldn’t pull yourself away to give me a call.”

“Hon, it’s not like that at all. Please let me explain.”

“Scott, I’m sorry; I’ve got to go. I’ll call you later this week at your apartment. Yes, you can have the phone now.”

I didn’t have a chance to say good-bye as the receiver clicked in my ear.

I should have immediately told her what happened at the task force office. It was upsetting. She thought I just didn’t care enough to call. I should have told her they questioned me about my knowledge of the two men and the hockey league. She didn’t even know I knew the murdered men, but maybe that was better. She hadn’t been herself for months. My call was all she needed to upset her more.

I was embarrassed calling her so late, but couldn’t call earlier to warn her. If I had only known that the task force would want to question me about knowing the two dead men. Who the hell can remember where they were on certain days or weeks before? It took me longer than I had expected to tell them what I was doing and where I was. I had no idea that they would consider me potentially involved in these murders.

In hindsight, I should have told Mike that I needed to call Lisa, but there was never a correct break point to interrupt their questioning. I didn’t want them to think I was trying to buy time to make up a story. I knew they were just doing their jobs, but it took me by surprise. I suppose if they didn’t pick my brain they might have missed some important details on these cases, but I was shocked that I was being questioned. It took several hours for them to be satisfied that I only knew these guys from that earlier hockey league. But that association took hours to convey. Bringing the article was a good move and made it look like I was not trying to hide anything.

Mike Miller, who I really wanted to see this morning, was a big help in getting the others to back off. He said he could vouch for me. He was more than a fellow team member, he had become a friend. Mike and I had spent some time on the phone since the earlier task force. I had kept him informed about my activities and how Lisa and I were doing.

He also knew I was going to attend Paddy’s lecture and asked me how it went. I said Paddy could be an inspirational speaker. I also mentioned he talked about profiling. Mike didn’t know what Paddy was lecturing on and said he would have to attend one of his future lectures.

I sat at the kitchen table and looked at my school work. I tried to get motivated, but I couldn’t get Lisa’s call or the murdered men out of my mind. Having an upsetting call with Lisa was not what I was looking forward to, and it was unexpected. I wanted to tell her about knowing the men. Maybe it was best she not know I knew them. She said she was worried about me.

It had been a trying day and having an upsetting call troubled me. She had been so different since her ordeal with Jimmy. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d been intimate. A year before I wouldn’t have been able to keep count.

I decided not to push the issue of sex, letting Lisa dictate our intimacy.

Chapter 8

It was a cold Friday evening in downtown Boston. The wind blew at street signs along Marlborough Street. An old woman watched the street from her second story window. She noticed a young couple struggling against the strong wind, and realized neither was dressed adequately for winter, especially on a night like this.

The young woman was holding her escort’s arm and her French beret. Both were leaning into the wind with their heads down. She thought about young college kids without much common sense while her grandfather clock chimed ten o’clock. They were halfway up the block now when she caught the sight of several other figures appearing from an alley just ahead of them.

Several men spread out across the sidewalk in front of the couple, the wind whipping at their heavy jackets. The light was not what it could be, and her eyes were not what they used to be. She wondered if the couple would see the men before they were right in their midst.

The couple must have sensed them, or possibly heard them. They stopped their forward motion and stared without moving, only a few feet separating them. She focused her eyes, watching the four men move slowly toward the couple, who were still stopped, leaning into the wind. The men started to pass the couple, so they resumed their walking.

However, it was obvious that only two of the men had actually passed the couple, when they turned to focus on the couple. The other two men were now blocking their path. She could not tell if there was any exchange of words, but the men who had circled the couple now closed in behind them.

Within the blink of an eye, three men jumped the young man, and the fourth grabbed the young woman around the waist. She started to flail her arms at the figure, her hat flying into the air, caught by the wind. The man had his other hand over her mouth and was now lifting her, almost dragging her back toward the alley.

The young man was now laying face down on the sidewalk motionless. The three men were jumping up and down, their attention quickly diverted to the alley entrance, and what the fourth man was doing. They reached down for the young man’s hands and dragged him toward the alley.

The woman could not believe her eyes but did not have a phone to call the police. The confrontation only lasted a couple of minutes, but she had been frozen in her chair, not believing what had happened.

She saw new movement. It was the girl running from the alley with some of her clothes missing. She didn’t get far. The girl was swept up before she got to the curb. The woman also saw some clothes caught in the wind, blowing down the sidewalk.

The girl must have screamed because one of the men caught her, threw her down and then punched her in the face. He picked her up, putting her limp body over his shoulder. Instead of heading back into the alley, he carried her to a parked car just beyond the alley.

Another man opened the back door of the car and threw her in. The two men ran back into the alley where the young man had been dragged. All four men came out of the alley, carrying the motionless young man over to the car. They opened the front door and threw the young man inside.

Simultaneously, the opposite side rear car door opened and the girl tried to exit. She was roughly and quickly yanked back inside. Moments later, the car pulled out of the parking spot, lights off, and raced down the street. She saw the flash of brake lights and then the headlights as they turned the corner.

The woman’s heart was racing. She held her hands to her chest to catch her breath. She had obviously witnessed an abduction and feared for their well-being. She feared mostly for the girl. She looked back out the window and saw the girl’s beret folded against a parking meter.

She looked to see if there were any lights on in any of the other apartment windows, but, to her surprise, they were in darkness. She thought about her own granddaughter, attending Northeastern University, and was relieved it was not her who had had this misfortune.

By the time she could talk to the police it would be too late for them. What did she have?  All she saw were four dark figures and a large black car. She thought to herself,
what
is this world coming to?
And she pulled her shade down, turning on her light to go to her bedroom. Someone else must have witnessed what happened and would surely report it.

* * *

The black car wasted no time getting out of the Back Bay area and headed east toward the waterfront. Two of the men were in the back seat with the young woman. The other two were in the front seat, with the guy riding shotgun holding a large switchblade against his captive’s neck. The young man was awake now, being forced to watch his female companion in the back.

She was in the middle of the back seat facing him, her wrists tied to the hanging side straps over each rear door. The two men in the rear seat had their own knives out. One of the men moved the back of his blade down her cheek and lightly across her neck.

He leered at her, moving his knife down between her breasts, which were covered by her lace bra. Although it was dark in the car, the street lights periodically illuminated her pearl white body.

The young man felt the pressure of the knife, more when the car swayed, and feared the knife would soon cut his throat. He considered his situation, knowing they could kill him. He looked at Cathy and realized she was in a serious situation herself. If he tried to free himself, would it be futile, causing both of them to be killed?

The men were taunting her, creating a frenzy of rage. She cried out in pain and humiliation. She tried to think about other things and not worry about their lives, but the tears were already running.

The car came to a sudden stop where there were no streetlights. The light came on inside the car as the doors were flung open. The men dragged Bob out with them. Cathy tried to ignore her nudity, but she could see them all looking back at her.

In one quick instant, they hit Bob on the back of his neck and he immediately collapsed to the pavement. One of the men tried to lift him, but it took two of them to do it. She thought they were going to stab him once he was standing, but, instead, one man put Bob over his shoulder, disappearing into the dark.

She could feel the ocean air as the other two men, who were previously in the front seat, jumped into the car beside her. They immediately made their own lewd comments about her naked body. One of the men in back leaned his body across hers and licked the tears now streaming down her cheeks. The front doors closed. She welcomed the dark interior. The car roared off.

She thought they must have killed Bob, dumping his body in that building. She could finally close her eyes, having already accepted her own fate. She said a silent prayer, for Bob and herself.

* * *

Waiting for the delivery was the worst part of the process. It was eleven o’clock and the delivery should have been dropped off over an hour ago. Red, which is what her friends call her, could feel the wind slamming into the old wooden building, causing it to creak and groan. There would be more groaning later when they took their revenge on this next young victim.

She listened as the other three women recounted the torture of the last two victims. Looking at them, nobody would ever expect them to be involved in killing. However, they were like sharks smelling blood, it was a feeding frenzy, one woman’s rage fueling the others. They had agreed at the outset killing the men was too kind; each of the men had to suffer and regret what he had done.

The next victim was her personal revenge. She had participated in the other men’s torture, but Bob would be primarily hers. The other women would follow her lead. She was paying more attention to the sound the building was making, rather than to her friends. When she first discovered this building, she realized it would be the perfect place to take revenge for what happened to her. However, she couldn’t do it alone. That was when she thought about the other women she had met, all having similar traumas in their lives. She contacted each of them a few months ago, and all were willing to give up everything to revenge their rapes. The rest was making history.

She remembered her first impressions of the building and why it provided the opportunity for revenge. The building was remote to the city, so no one could see them coming and going on weekends. The business in the other half of the building only operated during the week.

The coal chute allowed for delivery of the men, without having to deal with the abductors. The elevator, although old and rickety, was still functional and provided a means to transport the men from the basement to each of the other two floors.

The wash, or shower area, gave them the means to clean the men of any blood or coal dust. The fact that it only provided freezing cold water was an added benefit, but not to the men. She didn’t know much of the building’s history, but it had been used for cold storage.

The freezer compartment was conveniently located next to the shower area. Although not fully operational, it was a sufficient cold torture. She remembered each of the last two men hanging from their ankles, naked and vulnerable. They both begged to be killed, but in due time. Although the men had not endured the years of pain and suffering each of the women had experienced, the weekend was a condensed enough version to have the men regret what they had done.

She thought of Bob—if he only hadn’t tormented her after the rape by his friends, she might have lived with the ordeal. However, threatening her sister sealed his fate.

She left the other women, walking up the stairs to the display area. She flipped the lights on in the display and studied the remnants of the men. The lights made the frost on the body parts sparkle.

Her breathing quickened, and she could hear her heart beating. She closed her eyes and pictured Bob tied to the guillotine platform. How fitting; it reminded her of being tied to the bed all weekend. She pictured his expression when she showed him the knife that would be used to take his most precious parts. The other women would be taunting him. It was one last chance for each of the men to beg for his life, but to no avail.

She opened her eyes and stepped to the next display. What a deterrent this display would be to men who contemplated rape. She could see her reflection in the glass. Her beautiful face looked distorted with her nostrils flared and her eyes staring wildly. Her red hair and ghostly complexion was something she hadn’t observed before.

Her mind wandered back to those days when she was only sixteen, infatuated with her next door neighbor, a star high school sports figure. She knew she might have asked for some of what happened but being raped by several of Bob’s friends was the final straw. His threat to get her younger sister if she ever told anyone set her on the road to get even with him.

Tonight, she would finally make him regret what he did and threatened to do. She knew when Bob screamed his final scream, she would be screaming with him.

Her trance was interrupted by the other women joining her. She was still lost in her own thoughts, and they silently stared at their trophies together.

* * *

The long wait was over. The now familiar sound the body made when it was dumped down the coal chute interrupted their thoughts. It was now their turn to demonstrate to Bob what his dirty deeds had rewarded him.

They took the freight elevator to the basement and turned on the lights. There in the corner was Bob’s unconscious and bound body. The delivery team had obviously mistreated him, but he was still alive, totally covered in coal dust.

The four of them dragged his body to the elevator. The blood on his face and neck were more visible in the light. They repeated the process, dragging him to the shower area. They had learned their routine well and in just a matter of a few minutes had him naked and strung up by his ankles.

The cold spray of the water hoses brought him to, but they had him blindfolded so he couldn’t see them or where he was. They stopped the water and used their brushes to clean off the coal dust along with a layer of skin from areas not covered by dust.

The vast warehouse building shielded his screams, and incited them to be more deliberate on his precious parts. When they felt they had indeed caused him sufficient pain, it was time to show him his fate.

They left him suspended, hanging upside down from the rolling carriage and wheeled him to the elevator. The elevator was an aged device that gave them a chance to spin him and poke at him on the way. When the elevator stopped and the gate lifted, they wheeled him to the first display case and turned on the display lights. The blindfold was removed. It took him a few seconds to focus, but soon he confirmed women were indeed holding him captive.

One of them untied the hoist and he dropped to the floor with a thud. They stood him up, but his hands and ankles were still tied. He wasn’t going anywhere. She talked to him, and then he realized who she was. She told him why he was being held and reminded him what he had done to warrant this treatment.

He was shown the two trophies consisting of body parts from the other two men. There was good news and bad news for him. This fate would not come for several hours.

With that, he was hoisted off his feet, suspended and brought back to the first floor for more water spray treatment. Later, he would be moved to the cold storage room. This would give them an opportunity to catch some sleep before resuming their treatment and her revenge.