The Christmas Killer (3 page)

When they left Bertha Sinclair’s apartment, Jake let Mills walk ahead towards the car. He took out his phone and returned his earlier missed call.

Leigh, his wife, answered halfway through the third ring. ‘So, you
do
have our number.’

‘Sorry, honey. It’s been a rough shift.’

‘It’s been a rough month back here,’ said Leigh, any playful sarcasm thrown aside. ‘The baby’s been crying all day. He screams when I hold him, he screams when I put him down. The house is in a mess. And Faith is in another one of her moods.’

Faith, their eldest, was twelve and beginning to move awkwardly into her teenage years. His sweet princess had been replaced by a hormone-driven she-devil. Come to think of it, since the birth of Jakey six weeks ago, his wife had been replaced by a hormone-driven she-devil too.

‘She needs to start pulling her weight around here,’ Leigh continued. ‘And so do you.’

‘I know, honey. I’m sorry.’

‘You OK?’ she asked, sounding concerned. She
must have heard the catch in his voice. After fifteen years together, she knew him too well.

‘We caught a bad one this morning,’ he said. ‘Young mother. Murdered. Her four-year-old has just been taken in by social services.’

‘I’m sorry, babe.’ She paused and then sighed. ‘Wow, sometimes you just need things put into perspective.’ There was a silence, then Leigh said in a smaller voice, ‘But Jeanette isn’t helping …’

Jake sighed. His mother had always got on with Leigh, but dementia had struck when she hit her seventies. She was no longer able to care for herself, so Jake had had her move in with his family when they came to Littleton. But it wasn’t working out.

‘I love you, babe. Don’t hold dinner for me,’ he said.

‘Right back at you.’ The line went dead. He put his phone back into his pocket and looked at Mills.

‘Babysitter said it’s a short walk. So we’ll walk. Get a feel for the area.’

They went from the babysitter’s down a side street, then took a left. The buildings were small single-storey houses, most with a porch and a tiny yard out the front. This was a poor neighbourhood but a family neighbourhood. It was quiet – kids at school, parents at work – but this wasn’t a dangerous area. Jake would feel OK about Faith walking around here.

After another fifty yards they reached number 149. As they approached, Jake could feel the pressure
building in his stomach, remembering the peptic ulcer he’d had the year before.

Don’t make me kick your ass again
, he told it.

It was a small wood-frame house with a postage stamp of grass in front and what looked like a junkyard at the rear: a blocky bundle covered with a tarpaulin – obviously a semi-retired barbecue – plastic chairs and piles of weathered children’s toys filled the small space. An alley ran down one side. There was a low wire fence at the front, with a broken-down wooden gate leaning at a crazy angle. The gate threw a long shadow in the afternoon sunlight. Mills went straight up to it.

‘Slow down,’ said Jake.

Mills looked at him, but Jake just stood there. He looked up and down the road.
No cover, but late at night there’d be no one to observe. It might work.

He looked into the yard, then up towards the door. Gently, using the sleeve of his coat, Jake pushed the gate open. He walked up to the front door and looked in through the pane of glass at the top. The hallway was dark, but nothing seemed disturbed.

He wasn’t feeling it.

He looked around again and his eyes fell on something in the alleyway on the other side of the fence. There were some weeds trampled and tortured down in one corner. ‘I think we’ve found our kill site,’ he told Mills. ‘He went in the back door.’

‘How do you know?’

How
did
he know?

Mills shook his head in disbelief but stood back to let his partner lead.

Jake walked down the alley to the rear of the house. In his head it was almost as if he was watching a movie in silhouette. He couldn’t see the details, but he could get the gist of what was happening.

You can feel the weight of the body. It’s so heavy, inert. How long have you dragged her? Did she struggle? No, she was already dead
. But that didn’t gel either. More likely she was unconscious.
You wanted her awake when you killed her.

The door was locked but seemed flimsy. This was where he had dragged her in.

‘We have probable cause. I say we enter,’ Jake said.

‘No argument from me,’ said Mills. ‘I’ll call it in.’

As Mills radioed the station Jake drew his knee up to his chest and thrust out his heel, hitting the door just below the lock. He kicked it three times in quick succession, then hit it with his shoulder. The door opened.

The two detectives entered the house.

Inside the kitchen there was a dirty coffee mug on the counter and a few plates in the sink. The bin was overflowing. There were three chairs around a small table – part of a set.

‘Chair’s missing,’ said Jake, pointing to the table. ‘She was tied to it.’

‘Yeah, right. And the tooth fairy tickled her with a feather duster,’ joked Mills. He was about to go into the next room when Jake placed a restraining hand on his elbow.

He closed his eyes and tried to see how it must have been.
You’re under pressure because you’ve been dragging her for a while
. Jake could see it, he could feel an ache in his arms as if he had used them, could see the crumpled body at his feet, feel the panting from the exertion. But it was all vague, images replacing each other like photographs in a slide show. He needed those images to sharpen – he needed them to slow down.
It’s late at night, she’s coming home. Are you waiting for her or would anyone do? It’s so cold the streets are empty, but you can’t risk taking her in the open. You lure her into the alley and you chloroform her there. Or maybe you club her over the head? Then you drag her through the alley, across the backyard and into her house.

‘He’s strong, and he knows the area,’ said Jake. Mills was about to open his mouth, but Jake continued, ‘And he knew where she lived. So he at least
knows
Littleton. Maybe he’s visited, numerous times. He might have family here or something. But it’s more likely he’s a local.’

‘The boyfriend?’ asked Mills. ‘He’d have a key to this place.’

‘No sign of the door being kicked in,’ Jake agreed.

‘Until we came along,’ Mills joked. When he saw that Jake was not smiling, he pursed his lips. ‘Can we search the rest of the house now?’ he asked.

Jake nodded.

Using his coat sleeve again, so as not to add his own prints to any left by the murderer, Jake depressed the
handle and pushed the kitchen door open. He stood in the doorway and looked into the shadowy interior.

Mills stood behind him, taking in the scene over his shoulder. ‘Jackpot,’ he whispered.

The smell came first. The earthy, coppery odour of freshly spilt blood overlaid with other smells – faeces and urine – but the blood predominated. It was the smell of the slaughterhouse.

Jake reached for his belt and unhooked a small penlight. He swept the beam over the room. The living room – less disturbed than he expected: a knocked-over table, and the television had fallen from its stand. The floor was cluttered, but no more so than in his own home. Kids did that. In the centre of the floor, its back against the toppled coffee table, stood the fourth kitchen chair. There were dark stains on the wood.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, we have ourselves a murder scene,’ said Mills, and spoke into his radio, asking for the forensics to come.

Using the penlight to pick his route, Jake made his way slowly to the opposite wall and flipped the switch, throwing the room into harsh electric light. Now the stains on the wooden chair were visible as dark gouts of blood. There were also bloodstains on the threadbare carpet under the chair and some on the coffee
table. Some snaked all the way to a limp, pathetic Christmas tree in the far corner, touching the edges of a present laid beneath it.

The red tag said, ‘To Kelly, from Mommy xoxo’.

He stood in the centre of the room and saw how it must have happened
. It’s late. The neighbours are in bed. You come to the door and leave the body down on the ground while you search her purse. You want to find her wallet so we can identify her quickly.

Here Jake paused and scanned the room. He looked through the connecting door into the kitchen. Yes, in the corner, tossed casually away, was a woman’s purse.

You shoved some junk aside, kicked the coffee table out of the way, overturning it. You laid her down in the centre of the room. Then you went into the kitchen for the chair. After putting the chair against the overturned table you tried to pull her up on to it. That must have been when she woke up. There was a brief struggle – the television was knocked over. But you got her under control again and tied her to the chair.

He scanned the floor again. No ropes.

‘I’m not so sure I like the boyfriend for this,’ said Jake. ‘The killer brought rope with him and took it away again after. That’s a murder kit. We might be looking for someone who has either done this before … or has been building up to it.’

Mills winced before he answered the question Jake was about to ask. ‘I don’t recall any recent reports of women attacked on the street, no attempted
abductions. Nothing like that. You might be overthinking this one a little, city slicker,’ said Mills with a dark laugh.

Was he? He had done so before – thrown himself into cases back in Chicago, ending up mired in the minds of the offenders. Sometimes the simple solution really was the right one. Sometimes the boyfriend really did do it. Grounding himself with that thought, Jake crouched. Near the leg of the chair was a white speck.

‘Fuck,’ said Mills, his eyes on Jake. ‘I could have done without seeing that.’

It was a molar. Jake looked around quickly and found two more.

‘She was conscious throughout the whole thing,’ he said.

Mills exhaled a long breath.

Just then both detectives heard the clatter of the gate in the yard being roughly pushed aside.

The scrape of a key being inserted into the lock.

The whine of the front door as it opened.

Footsteps came down the short hall. Mills’s breath caught in his throat just as the living room door swung open, revealing a large black man in his late twenties, wearing a puffy parka that had seen better days.

He paused in the doorway. ‘The fuck are you assholes doing in my house?’ he shouted.

Sonny. The boyfriend.

Mills reached for his badge.

‘Ah, shit!’ Sonny yelled, his sneakers scraping the floor as he turned and bolted.

Jake ran after him.
Sometimes
, he told himself again,
the boyfriend really did do it
.

Jake was out on to the street and running hard after Sonny – a big man in bad shape, and the sidewalk was slick and icy. Not the best conditions for an escape. In a few long strides Jake had closed the gap. He judged his lunge to perfection. He drew level, then placed a hand on Sonny’s shoulder, gripping the jacket. At the same time he caught his right leg in between Sonny’s legs, who went down hard. Jake went down too but was able to twist so that Sonny broke his fall. Almost as soon as he hit the ground Jake was spinning, muscle memory kicking in. Within a second he had flipped Sonny on to his stomach and pinned his hands securely behind his back.

By now Mills had jogged up. He came to a stop, both arms straight out and cradling a big Smith & Wesson.

‘Get up, shit head, and assume the position,’ he growled.

Jake looked up at Mills. ‘I hope you’re talking to him.’

Sonny got to his feet and stood with his arms raised. The movement pulled his parka up, revealing two
handguns whose barrels disappeared beneath the belt line of his jeans. Jake stepped forward and took them, placing them on the ground. There was a beat-up old Chevy nearby. Jake marched Sonny over to it. Sonny knew the drill, placing both hands on the hood and spreading his legs.

‘I’m not saying nothing,’ he said.

As Mills stepped up to cuff him, Jake reached into his pocket and took out his mobile phone. Whatever niggling feeling he might have had about this case, there was no way to argue – Sonny was an armed man fleeing the scene of a murder. Time to call it in and hope it was one of those open-and-shut cases.

‘Put me through to the colonel,’ he said.

‘Out at a meeting with the DA,’ the desk sergeant replied, his voice robotic.

‘If he gets back before us, tell him we’re bringing in a suspect.’ Jake ended the call.

When he turned back, Mills was standing there with a big grin on his face, the gun now held by his side. Sonny glowered, a sullen hulk radiating defiance.

Mills did the honours: ‘I am arresting you on suspicion of the murder of Marcia Lamb.’

Sonny’s eyes widened in shock. ‘What the fuck?’

‘You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be … Shit, you know the Miranda rights as well as I do.’ Mills shook his head and pushed Sonny forward. ‘Walk.’

They turned back towards their car. They weren’t
within ten feet of it before Jake heard approaching steps.

‘Is this where she was killed?’ Chuck Ford asked as he appeared first at Jake’s side, then hanging back to walk on their heels. He carried a pen and pad. His pupils were dilated like he was on something, but Jake had seen the buzz journalists got from a story before.

Jake glared at him. ‘Who?’

‘I was hoping you’d tell me,’ he said, tapping his pen against his pad. ‘We need official confirmation on the victim’s name.’

Jake kept walking towards the car.

‘I’m only doing my job,’ said Ford.

Mills handed Sonny off to Jake before rounding on the reporter. ‘You stepped over the line this morning. Almost caused a goddamned riot outside a church – at fucking Christmas time, no less. So don’t talk to me about “doing my job”. You are the pus inside the pimple on the ass of the department. Do you need me to spell that out for you? A-S-S.’

But Chuck wasn’t listening any more. He was looking behind them. And he was smiling.

Both cops turned and Jake saw two black and whites and a big white forensics van pulling up on the street.

‘I think I just got my confirmation,’ said Chuck. ‘But I can make you look good if you help me out.’ He nodded towards the handcuffed Sonny. ‘Can I tell my readers you have caught the killer – the deranged
individual who slaughtered a young mom before she could celebrate Christmas with her kid?’

‘You’re a dick, Ford,’ said Mills as they reached the car. ‘One of these days you’ll get what’s coming to you.’

‘Yeah, I will,’ said Ford. ‘A Pulitzer.’

Jake just stood there.
Keep calm
, he told himself.
Remember Chicago.

Suddenly Sonny lunged towards the reporter, trying to break free from Jake and Mills. ‘I didn’t do it!’ he shouted. ‘They’re trying to frame me, man!’

Jake pushed past Chuck and bundled Sonny into the car before he could give Chuck any more for his article. The big man cursed as his head bumped the roof, but Jake didn’t care. He got in beside him while Mills got into the driver’s seat. Within seconds, Mills was pulling away from the kerb.

Jake glared at the small, indistinct shape of Chuck Ford in the rear-view mirror.

‘Fucking journalists.’