Shattered (25 page)

“Good heavens.” Her eyes were wide when he finished. “Derrick, you're dealing with a serial killer. An honest-to-God, headline-making serial killer.”

“We hope he doesn't make headlines,” Derrick said grimly, “at least not yet. But between Guy Dennison and the Anderson girl's parents, I don't know how much longer we're going to be able to keep a lid on it.”

He put the bowl of popcorn in her lap and the two mugs of chocolate on the coffee table on which she rested her feet. He sat down on the sofa beside her and swung her white-stockinged feet into his lap, massaging them gently.

Patsy said soberly, “If there's a serial killer on the loose in a community as small as St. T., I don't think you want to keep it quiet, Derrick. All these young girls here on spring break...” He felt her suppress a shudder. “It's like penning up a hungry coyote with a herd of sheep.”

“Yeah.” His own voice was heavy. Absently, he reached for the popcorn, thinking out loud. “But we're real close, now, Patsy. And what he did tonight, trying to lure Mrs. Dennison out to Lighthouse Point to kill her, that proves that he's getting desperate. He made a big mistake today, letting Ms. Capstone get away.”

Patsy said in alarm, “You don't think he'll come after her, do you?”

Derrick shook his head slowly. “No. She couldn't see his face, he must have known that. All she could tell us was that he had dark hair.”

And as soon as he said it, he knew something about that was wrong. Patsy picked up on it immediately. “That mug shot of Saddler,” she said alertly. “He had blond hair.”

Derrick studied the popcorn in his hand, frowning. “Easy to change the color of your hair. And it was dark in that shack. How well could she see?”

Then she said, “Isn't it kind of unusual for a serial killer to change his M.O.? I mean, if any of what you've put together so far is true, he has a definite pattern—he likes young girls who wear that strange necklace on the leather thong. Laura Capstone—or Carol Dennison for that matter—doesn't fit that profile at all.”

“Why,” wondered Derrick out loud, uneasily, “would a man who's established a pattern of kidnapping, raping, and killing young girls suddenly take to stalking a middle-aged woman—and man?”

“Well,” offered Patsy, though he could tell she was unconvinced, “there's the fact that Guy Dennison put him in jail.”

“Shit,” Derrick exclaimed suddenly, and sat up straight. “I knew there was something that bothered me about that! That girl who disappeared from here last year, the Conroy girl—we've been assuming that she was part of the pattern. But Saddler was in jail last year. If she does fit the pattern ... damn it, that file won't be here until late tomorrow, earliest. We could have been on the wrong track all along!”

Patsy looked at him with sudden comprehension. “Derrick, you don't think—”

The phone rang. Derrick picked it up on the second ring, still frowning.

It was the night dispatcher. “We got a call from the marina,” he said, “about a prowler who matches the description of that guy Saddler. I've dispatched three units and the sheriff said for you to meet them there.”

“Son of a bitch,” Derrick said, on his feet, “I'm on my way.”

He couldn't believe it was all over before he got there. The marina was lit up like a landing strip, blue lights flashing, uniforms everywhere. One of the night deputies was leading away a man in handcuffs, and none too gently either. Long got a good look at his face as he passed: It was Saddler.

And he had blond hair.

Sheriff Case was standing beside a blue pickup truck with two flat tires, talking to a big man with a half-chewed cigar in his mouth. When he saw Long, Case beckoned him over.

“I'll tell you the goddamn truth, Deputy,” said the sheriff, “if the public don't stop doing our damn jobs for us, we might just have to go into another line of work. This is Mr. Walt Marshall, proprietor of this fine establishment. I believe you might've been out this way not too long ago, left a flier with a picture of Mr. Saddler on it.”

It had been one of the first stops Long had made when he got the mug shots in. Guy Dennison lived here; he wanted to make sure everyone who worked at the marina had a good description of the man who was stalking him. He remembered Marshall well, a big taciturn man who had glared at him over the stump of that cigar and made Long glad he wasn't Saddler, if it meant coming up on the wrong side of this man.

It looked as though his observations on that occasion had been prophetic.

“Recognized him right away,” Marshall said matter-of-factly. “Saw him heading toward Guy's boat and knew it couldn't be anybody else. I called you folks, but hell, you're five minutes away at top speed. He would've been long gone by then. So when he came back out and got in his truck, I shot out his tires.”

He paused, chewing on the cigar. “Could've shot him, too, I guess, but I figured you'd want to talk to him first.”

Long looked at him for a moment, but was unable to determine whether or not the man was serious. He suspected he might not really want to know.

“Our men pulled up about that time,” supplied Case, “so no harm done. It was a clean arrest.”

“Well,” said Long, “I guess that's good news then. And”—he looked at Marshall—”I guess you have a permit for that gun.”

Marshall just glared at him. Case chuckled, then turned to accept a slip of paper from a young officer. He glanced at it, then tucked it in his pocket. “Truck is stolen,” he said. “So are the plates. Big surprise.”

Long looked around. “Where's Dennison?”

Marshall shrugged. “His car's not here. I figured he's not either.”

Long glanced at Case. “I'll check out the boat.”

Case nodded, then turned back to Marshall. “It'll be Deputy Long who takes your statement, if you'll come down to the office some time in the morning. Do you remember about how long it was from the time you first saw Saddler to the time you called us?”

“Three, four minutes. I thought he was just some kid looking for kicks at first. They do that sometimes, come out here looking for a place to screw or just hang out. Hell, I've caught one or two trying to take one of these babies out for a joy ride. I didn't think it was no more than that ‘til I saw where he was heading, and got a look at him.”

“Good spotting.”

Marshall shrugged. “I figured he'd show up here sooner or later. Say, did you find out what he was carrying?”

Case started to shake his head, then looked at Marshall, frowning. “What do you mean? He was carrying something?”

“Yeah, a knapsack or something.” Marshall was frowning, too. “He had it under his arm when he went down the ramp to the boat. But he didn't have it when he came back.”

The two men looked at each other as understanding dawned, slowly and horribly. Case turned.

Everything from that moment was in slow motion. Blue lights spinning sickly, slowly, obliquely out of focus. Saddler's face, looking up from behind the window of the squad car. Derrick Long, stepping onto the deck of Guy Dennison's boat, knocking on the cabin door in a perfunctory manner, reaching for the latch…

Case screamed, “Long, no!” and it sounded slowed down, attenuated, dragged across the blue-back sky: “Loonnnggg .... Nooooooo. . . . ”

Long turned his head at the sound of the sheriff's voice, very, very slowly, even as his hand turned the handle of the door on the cabin. The door swung open.

And the world exploded in light and flame.

~

Chapter Thirty-eight

S
heriff John Case said quietly, “Thirty years in law enforcement. And for the first time I'm thinking it might be too long.”

He stood at the window, hands in the pockets of his rumpled khakis, staring out at the first gray rays of dawn. The door to his office was closed but the clatter came through—phones ringing, doors slamming, voices, both hushed and excited, outraged and anguished: sounds of mourning, sounds of shock, sounds of vengeance.

“His wife is sick, not many people knew that. M.S. She's in remission now. A nurse down at the E.R. You probably know her. Pretty little thing.”

Guy felt something twist deep in his throat; he didn't even try to speak.

“I've only had to take that walk one other time in my life. The door I knocked on that time was my captain's wife's. Right after that I left the New Orleans Police Department. Thought, for some damn stupid reason, people don't die as much in small towns. Hell, I guess I was right—most of the time.”

Two things would stand out forever and uppermost about that night in Guy's mind: The look in Carol's eyes as she saw the smoldering remains of his boat, and the sight of the coroner wheeling away the body bag that contained the remains of the deputy who had given his life in the line of duty. Guy remembered wondering about that man's wife, and why he wasn't home with her, and feeling angry, so angry he couldn't even think.

It was a long time before he realized what it all meant. Saddler was in custody. Carol was safe. He was safe. Their ordeal was over, and the price they paid was a body bag containing the remains of a man they barely knew. A man who had only been trying to save their lives.

In the confusion and horror, they hadn't talked much. The sheriff, grim mouthed and taciturn, had given them only the barest details. Walt, as visibly shaken as Guy had ever seen him, kept saying, “Man, he had a bomb. I should've known it was a bomb he was carrying, I should've known it.” Walt was forgetting that he was, in fact, the hero of the occasion, if such a tragic business could be said to have any heroes.

It was just before dawn when Guy drove Carol back home, and that was when she said in a small, flat voice, “It was supposed to be you. You would have been there. It would have been you.” She didn't have to look at him when she said it. He knew what she was thinking, what she was feeling. The night between them was heavy with loss and fearful, guilty triumph and the weight of wrongs, terrible wrongs that could never be righted.

“Let me talk to him,” Guy said hoarsely now.

“Take a number.” Without turning, Case jerked a thumb over his shoulder to the squad room outside. “You and every one of those uniforms out there, two minutes alone with him ... shit, not that I'm not tempted.”

“It's my daughter, damn it!”

Case turned. His shoulders were slumped, his face gray and lined. He said, “He's not talking, Guy. We've got a lawyer on the way.”

Guy swore softly and pushed his hands through his hair. He knew that once the lawyer got there, any hope he had of interviewing the prisoner would be over. If he were any kind of lawyer at all, in fact, he would do his best to have his client moved out of this jail, even if it meant putting him in a state facility.

With a distant irony, Guy remembered one of his last encounters with Long had been over just such an issue. That time Guy had been an advocate of the accused.

He was just trying to catch a killer, Guy thought sickly. He was trying to find my daughter and protect my family, and he ended up dying for it.

“You can't question him without his lawyer present,” Guy said suddenly, turning on Case, “but that law doesn't apply to reporters.”

“Jesus Christ, Guy, you're not a reporter, you're the victim!”

“Let me talk to him, John,” Guy said urgently. “It may be our last chance and you know it.”

There was no alteration in the sheriff's tired, dull features for a time and Guy thought he would be turned down. Then a slow faint hardness crept into the other man's eyes and he said, “You're a reporter getting a story, that’s all.”

“I do it all the time,” Guy assured him.

Saddler had been put in the last cell in the row, out of sight of the unemployed highway worker who was overdue on his child support, and out of hearing of the DUI who was snoring in the first cell. Saddler was reclining on the bunk when the metal door closed behind them. He got to his feet, a nasty look of recognition sliding onto his face when he saw Guy.

“You've got a visitor,” Case said. “I think you know Mr. Dennison. He works for the local paper here. He just wants to ask you a few questions.”

Grinning, Saddler walked up to the bars. “I just bet he does.” And he looked at the sheriff. “Hey, is this legal, man? I've got my rights, you know.”

But he didn't seem very concerned, and the grin returned when Case turned and walked away without a word. “Kind of a cranky old coot, ain't he?” he remarked.

Guy said, “I'm going to do you a favor, Saddler, and tell you something. You're in a backwoods jail in west Florida an hour's drive from nowhere. You're in a cell all by yourself at the end of the row where nobody can see or hear anything, and by the time that fancy lawyer of yours gets here, it could very well be too late, you following me?”

“Hey, are you threatening me?”

“You killed a cop,” Guy said sharply, “and they've lynched men in this county for less than that. Believe it or not, Saddler, I might be the best friend you've got right now.”

Saddler looked startled. “What the fuck are you talking about? I didn't kill nobody!”

“They didn't tell you? That bomb you planted on my boat. It went off and killed a deputy sheriff.”

Saddler looked momentarily confused, then he asserted, “They don't have a thing on me. This is bullshit man. They can't prove nothing.”