The Follower (41 page)

Katie was disgusted. Peter sounded so gross, so totally icky on the phone, she couldn’t believe she’d ever been attracted to him, that she’d thought he was charming. How could she have fallen for that bullshit? It must’ve been because she was rebounding from Andy. Otherwise, there was no way she would’ve been interested in a fucking weirdo like him.

She was deciding what to do, if she should tell Barasco that Peter had called or just forget about the whole thing, when the cell rang, flashing
PETER
again.

“The fuck’s wrong with you!” she screamed at the phone.

She let the voice mail pick up again, waited, then angrily called in for the message:

“Hey, Katie, it’s me again…um, Peter. Just occurred to me, maybe we could get together today sometime, maybe just for coffee or something just to talk. Or maybe we can go to dinner? I can make a reservation someplace special. So if you’re up for it, just—”

Unable to bear any more, Katie ended the call and turned the phone off.

She was terrified, back to how she’d been last night and this morning. Somehow she managed to calm down, convincing herself that she was probably panicking for no reason. She reminded herself that the police were on top of things now. They knew everything about Peter’s past and there was no way he could hurt her.

From the landline phone, Katie called Barasco and got his voice mail. She explained that Peter had left two messages and summarized them. She said she was very concerned and to call her back as soon as possible.

When she hung up, the phone started ringing and Peter’s cell number was flashing on the display.

“Fucking stop it,” she said, and pulled the cord out of the jack. She gave herself a pep talk—
You’re blowing things out of proportion…He didn’t threaten you…You told the police
. She was starting to relax a little when the intercom buzzed. It was as if somebody were listening to her thoughts and trying to do everything possible to scare the crap out of her. A rational voice in her head told her that it was probably Barasco coming back to ask her a few more questions. The irrational voice said it was Peter coming to chop her into pieces.

The intercom buzzed again, this time longer, steadier, more impatiently.

“Fuck you!” Katie shouted, and checked the locks again.

Then there was another buzz, even longer this time. She didn’t hear any construction going on in the apartment downstairs. It was like she was in the building all alone. She was kidding herself, thinking it was Barasco. Barasco would’ve
called to say he was coming over, and Himoto had her land-line number as well. It could be a delivery guy, from UPS or wherever. Those guys buzzed whenever packages arrived, but they didn’t buzz again and again like maniacs.

When the intercom buzzed for the fourth time, Katie decided it had to be Peter. Who else could it be? She considered talking to whoever it was on the intercom, and if it was Peter, telling him to leave her the fuck alone. But that would only incite him and that was the last thing she wanted to do. It would be a much better idea to ignore the whole thing, pretend she wasn’t home.

Then, as the intercom buzzed steadily, for what seemed like twenty seconds, Katie thought,
He knows I’n here
. She went to the phone, dialed 911, and explained to the operator that someone was trying to break into her building. Katie was so frantic she needed to repeat herself several times. The operator took her address and said someone would come by immediately to check out the situation.

The bell rang once more and then there was a long silence. It seemed to last two or three minutes. Katie hoped this meant that Peter had given up. She tried not to think about another possibility, that he had buzzed other apartments and someone had let him into the building. Terrified, Katie listened with her ear against the door, but didn’t hear any footsteps on the stairwell. If he did come up and tried to break in, she had no idea how she’d defend herself.

Still listening closely, she heard a sudden loud noise that shook the door. Assuming it was Peter banging, trying to get in, she screamed, and then a woman in the hallway said, “Are you okay in there?”

It was one of her neighbors. She was on her way out and had slammed her door.

Recovering from the near heart attack, Katie said, “Yeah…everything’s fine.”

It was quiet for a few seconds—Katie imagined the neighbor staring, puzzled, at the door to Katie’s apartment—and then the footsteps headed downstairs.

Katie continued to get hold of herself then realized the
huge mistake she’d made. She shouldn’t have let her neighbor leave. She should’ve told her what was going on, that someone was trying to get into the building, someone who might want to kill her. The woman could’ve stayed with her until the police arrived. But now the woman was going to open the door to the vestibule and Peter could be down there, waiting for someone to leave so he could get in.

Listening with her ear against the door again, Katie’s worst nightmare came true. She heard heavy footsteps on the stairs, and they were getting louder and louder.

When John Himoto arrived in
his office at the Nineteenth Precinct, he read the printouts Katie had left about the fire near Albany that had killed Peter Wells’s parents. There was a mention in the article of a Detective Sergeant Jeff Franklin from the Colonie Police Department. Although the fire had been six years ago, John called the department in Albany in the hope that Detective Franklin was still working there. It turned out he was—he’d been promoted to police chief—but unfortunately he was on vacation this week.

“Is there anyone else I can talk to who has knowledge of the case?” John asked.

John was put on hold for so long he thought he’d been forgotten, and then the woman came back on and said she wasn’t sure who John should speak to, but would have someone get in touch with him as soon as possible. About two hours later, a Detective Litsky called and said, “Jeff’s on vacation this week—Club Med, Cancún. Meanwhile, I can’t remember the last time I saw the ocean. But do I sound jealous?”

Impatient with the small talk, John said, “Do you know anything about the fire in Colonie that killed Eleanor and Charles Wells?”

“Oh, yeah. Actually, I was one of the first officers on the scene that day. I made detective since then.”

“Do you remember Peter Wells?”

“Yeah, I remember him. We thought he did it.”

“Why’s that?”

“There was just something off about the guy. He was too cool, you know what I mean?”

“Could he have been in shock?”

“Maybe…Maybe not. That was the thing about the guy—it was hard to tell. He was the type of guy you talked to and came away not knowing what the hell to think.”

“But you never brought charges.”

“We had no hard evidence and no witnesses—well, other than Peter Wells. The fire was ruled accidental, caused by a halogen lamp igniting curtains in the living room. The house was wood, went up like a matchbox.”

“How was Wells able to escape?”

“He wasn’t drunk, that’s how. The victims had been drinking and had passed out cold. Wells said he tried to get to them, but couldn’t. The big hero, or would-be hero. Yeah, he had all the bases covered, all right.”

“And I understand they each had a one-million-dollar insurance policy, right?”

“Yep, that was the suspected motive. But ‘suspected’ was the key word. I remember Jeff thought he did it, but Arson concluded it was an accident, and the insurance investigators must’ve felt the same way. So that was it—we had nothing to go on. Why? You think he has involvement in something downstate?”

“It’s starting to look that way,” John said.

He thanked Litsky for his time and immediately made another call—to Information in Massachusetts. He got the number for the Amherst Police Department, and after talking to several people there, he found out that a Detective Merker had handled the Heather Porter suicide investigation. John left a message for Merker, and about an hour later Merker, who sounded like he was in his fifties or sixties, returned the call.

Merker remembered the case clearly, said it was a very sad day.

“Any chance it wasn’t a suicide?” John asked.

“No chance at all,” Merker said. “A few people saw her jump. They were sunbathing on the dorm roof.”

“Do you remember something about a boyfriend of hers being killed?”

“A boyfriend?”

“Yeah. Maybe someone she was dating who had been killed, who she was distraught over.”

Merker thought about it, then said, “Nope, don’t remember anything like—Wait a second now. Yep, yep, it’s starting to ring a bell. It was unclear if it was a boyfriend of hers, or just some guy she…what do they say? Oh, yeah, ‘hooked up with.’ I forget his name but, yeah, I remember her friends saying that was one of the things she was upset about, that could’ve caused her to jump.”

“What about the friend? How did he die?”

“Fell off a roof, if I remember correctly. He was drunk at the time, at a frat party. Believe it or not, that happens quite often at college campuses around here. Actually, that’s why we thought Heather Porter might’ve jumped, to check out the same way her boyfriend died. Seemed to make some sense anyway. Of course, we had no way of knowing—”

“I’n sorry,” John said. “You said he was drunk?”

John remembered what Detective Litsky had said, about how Peter Wells’s parents had been intoxicated.

“Oh, yeah, he was drunk all right,” Merker said. “I think totally shitfaced is the term
du jour
. There was a frat party going on, and he’d been drinking all night.”

“Any chance of foul play?”

“We looked into it, sure. I think there was a witness or two, I don’t really remember. But we concluded it was an accident—just another drunk kid taking the Budweiser dive. That’s what we call it up here.”

John thanked Merker for his time, then called Barasco, mildly surprised that the schmuck bothered picking up.

“What now?” Barasco asked.

“You talk to Peter Wells yet?”

“Hey, didn’t I tell you to stay out of my case?”

“Cut the shit, all right? I just talked to a couple of cops upstate—this guy could be dangerous. Have you brought him in yet or what?”

“Not yet,” Barasco said.

“Why not?”

“Because we can’t locate him, that’s why. He isn’t answering his cell phone and he hasn’t been home all day.”

The footsteps on the stairs were
getting louder. Katie, listening at the door, was immobilized for a few moments, unable to think clearly or do anything, then she darted into the bathroom and locked herself in. She sat on the closed toilet and waited, praying.

There were a couple of loud knocks on the front door.

“Leave me the fuck alone!” she screamed, realizing a moment later that was the worst thing she could’ve done. It would’ve been better to stay silent, make him think she wasn’t home.

“Hello? Are you able to come to the door?”

It wasn’t Peter. The guy sounded official, like a cop.

Katie left the bathroom, then said, “Who’s there?”

“Police.”

Relieved, muttering, “Thank God,” Katie looked through the peephole, then opened the door and saw two cops there—a black guy and a white woman.

“Katie Porter?” the guy asked.

“Yes,” Katie said. “Come in, please come in.”

The cops entered the apartment, then Katie said, “Thanks so much for coming over. I was afraid it was him.”

“Who’s him?” the woman asked.

Katie explained what was going on with Peter, and how she’d spoken to the detectives about the two murders.

“There was no one in the vestibule when we arrived,” the male cop said.

“Well, he was there before you came,” Katie said. “He was ringing the bell for, like, fifteen minutes.”

She knew she was exaggerating, but so what?

“How do you know it was him?” the woman asked.

“It had to be him. He was just calling me and then the bell started ringing.”

“Maybe it was a delivery guy or something,” the man said.

“I thought of that, but I’n not expecting any deliveries. I’n telling you, it was Peter.”

“We’ll see if anyone’s down there when we leave,” the man said.

“Can’t you stay here?” Katie said. “My parents are gonna be here soon, in like an hour or two, but can you stay till they get here?”

“I’n afraid we can’t. If anyone starts ringing your bell again and you become alarmed, you can call us again and report it. We have officers in this area all the time and we can be here in five minutes.”

“Or we can take you someplace if you like,” the woman said.

Katie considered this, but she didn’t want to leave. She was afraid if she was out somewhere in public, Peter would come up to her and strangle her, or bash her head in.

“I’n not going anywhere,” she said.

The cops could probably tell how frightened she was because the guy said, “It seems like you have a very secure apartment here. I see you’ve got a Medeco lock. You can call the detectives you spoke to just to let them know you’re concerned but as of right now we don’t see anything that alarms us. The front door downstairs seems very functional and secure. I would just try to relax until your parents get here.”

“Will you check to make sure he’s not in the building? Maybe he’s hiding in the stairwell or something.”

“Yes, we’ll absolutely make sure he’s not on the premises,” the woman said.

Katie waited with the door open while the cops checked the stairwell, including going all the way up to the roof. They returned and told Katie that everything looked good and that
the roof entrance was locked so no one could’ve gotten in. They advised her to wait in her apartment with the door bolted and chained until her parents came, and then they left.

It took Katie a while to get a grip again, but she eventually did. For all she knew, it had been a delivery person ringing the bell after all. She wasn’t convinced, but she felt more relaxed when she heard the construction resuming downstairs. At least there were people in the building nearby if she needed help.