Authors: Wayne Batson
“I get reckless when I’m tired…and when things are trying to tear my head off.”
“Whatever,” Rez said. “Just tell me you got something. Tell me the reason the place is wrecked is because you were taking down Smiling Jack and his accomplice.”
“I wish I could,” I said, releasing a sigh like a flat tire. “The killers were already gone when I got there.”
“Then who the heck were you fighting?”
“Remember the guy you shot in the alley?” I asked. “The guy with the invisibility suit? You called him a kind of terrorist. Well, there were a lot more of those guys.”
The next thing Rez said was not only unladylike but it bordered on startling. Then, she said, “Four year intervals.”
“What?”
“Smiling Jack’s killing cycles came at four year intervals…you know what else does?”
“It wasn’t four,” I said. “It was four, then eight, right?”
“Divisible by four, then,” Rez grumbled. “Look, I did some hunting around, and each killing cycle so far coincides with the impending election of U.S. Presidential candidate who happens to be Pro Life.”
“Wait,” I said. “What about four years after the first killing cycle?”
“Pro Choice.”
“Possibly still a coincidence,” I said.
“Possibly.” I could hear her muffle the phone with her hand. Then I heard muted conversation, but I couldn’t make out the words. “I gotta go,” she came on suddenly. “Don’t leave town.”
The line went dead. I stared at the phone and noted that it was still blinking two messages: low battery and, this time, one missed call. I didn’t recognize the number but pressed call.
“Panama City Beach Hospital Center,” answered a mellow southern voice. “To whom may I direct your call?”
Then, the phone died.
Doc,
I thought.
Had to be.
I fired up the assassin’s car, wondering what Doc Shepherd had to say. We hadn’t exactly parted on good terms.
* * *
* * *
* * *
* * *
“Rezvani!” Deputy Director Barnes thundered. “Get in here!”
Rez hustled into the conference room and found Barnes, as well as Agent LePoast huddled in front of a computer screen.
“Sir?” Rez said as she stepped closer to the backs of their chairs. They didn’t answer.
“Scroll up,” Barnes said. “There. Do you see?”
LePoast leaned closer to the screen. His head went very still. “Son of a…how’d you see that with your old eyes?”
“Careful, LePoast,” Barnes warned. “I might replace you with Rezvani here.”
Rez looked back and forth between the two men and the wide, flatscreen monitor. There was a morgue photo, the victim from the Butterfly Refuge. There was also a scan of an old newspaper article. It had a black and white photo of a young girl in what looked like a school portrait. The girl couldn’t have been more than six or seven. She wore pigtails and freckles and had big bright eyes that somehow looked blue even in black and white.
“Seriously,” LePoast said, “Now that I see them side-by-side, I get it. But how’d you see this out of all those articles?”
“It’s the smirk,” he said. “Right corner of her mouth…that mischievous little curl.”
“Yeah, yeah,” LePoast said. “It’s hard to see it on the vic because…well, you know.” He cleared his throat. “Still, we’ll need the DNA. Gotta be certain.”
“It’s her,” Barnes said, using his Final Word tone. He leaned away from the monitor for Rez and said, “Special Agent Rezvani, meet Pamela Katherine Kearney of Anchorage, Alaska.”
* * *
* * *
* * *
* * *
If there were no complications, Doctor Shepherd was expected to be in surgery for the next six hours.
This was the news I got from the Nurse Pelagris at Panama City Beach Hospital Center’s cardiac floor. Six hours. I’d stood in a towel at quite possibly the last pay phone on planet earth…and six hours was all I got for my trouble.
I’d already wasted time eating and then trying to digest my ridiculously large breakfast—and that just to get to ten o’clock so I could find a place to purchase new clothes. Now, it looked like I’d have to wait some more. If something went wrong during surgery, there was no telling how much more the wait might be increased. I sighed, buckled up, and pulled out onto Front Beach Road.
A few miles from Smack Burger and just a stone’s throw from the sun-dappled Gulf, I found Mad Monk’s Surf Shop. Colorful kites sailed high above the store, and the front door was propped open by a faux conch shell the size of park bench. Getting out of the low slung sports car without losing one of my two towels was no easy task. I managed, but it was a close thing. And, in the process, I learned just how chilly the morning air off the Gulf could be.
I decided to play it like I’d just walked in off the beach, that the towels were just to keep a wet swimsuit from dripping all over the shop’s floor. Then, I’d start browsing, pick up what I need, and duck into the nearest changing room. I’d wear the stuff to the register, pay for it, and move on. No scene. As little attention as possible. Low key.
The moment I set foot in the store someone shouted, “Dude! What happened, you fall into a pool of bleach?”
Against my better judgment, I froze in place and looked left and right, as if he might be talking to someone—anyone—else. I saw the guy then, at the counter. He had corn rows, a tan two shades darker than chocolate, and enough shell necklaces to outfit a hydra. He looked like he was born to work in a surf shop. And he looked like he was thoroughly content to draw attention to me.
“Seriously, boss,” the tan man continued, “you just fly in from Siberia, or what? Never seen skin so white.”
So much for low key. A teenage couple near the dressing rooms laughed it up. A little girl pointed me out to her father. The look on her face made me want to lock myself up behind bars. Poor kid. I kept my distance from the other customers as I browsed. The loquacious shopkeeper was another matter.
I found a pair of long cargo shorts with a rope-tie belt. It looked to be about my size. I was browsing through a rack of button-down shirts when the guy with cornrows appeared right in front of me.
“Hey, bro,” he said, “you have like a skin condition or something?”
“Something like that,” I replied.
“Oh, hey, you know I was just messing. If I’d known, I would’na said Jack. I’m totally into affirmative toleration, y’know?”
“You always insult new customers?” I asked.
“Pretty much,” he said.
“Make a lot of sales that way?”
“People come in here expect a little crazy,” he said. “I’m Mike the Mad Monk, man.”
“You have a gift for alliteration,” I said. I held up a black shirt decorated with electric blue stick figures. “You have this in a 3XL?”
“Big dude, huh?” he asked. His eyes widened as if he hadn’t really looked at me before this moment. “Whoa, you are a big dude.” He took the shirt. “Back in a flash.”
Mad Monk Mike returned moments later with a different shirt. It had a lot of black in it, but the collar, tails, and sleeves all bled from black to a kind of vibrant sea green. “So, dude, the one you got is XL only. But this one is 3X; thought it would look better on ya’ anyway. The green’ll make you look less shockingly pale, y’know?”
“You’ve really got this sales approach down,” I said, taking the shirt.
“Hey, thanks, bro,” he said. “That’s mighty white of you.” He burst out laughing. “Hey, hey, sorry, man. Couldn’t resist.”
I rolled my eyes and strode to the nearest dressing room. The shorts and shirt fit well, and I found a pair of rugged-looking sandals. I paid Mad Monk Mike with more of the assassin’s money and went back to the car. The temperature had gone up twenty degrees in the last half hour. The car’s interior was baking, so I was grateful to have something substantial between flesh and upholstery.
The cell phone had charged up two bars, and again, the missed call symbol blinked on the display. “This is getting ridiculous,” I muttered, checking the number. It was Rez. I dialed.
“Special Agent Rezvani,” she answered, her tone professional and disinterested. Before I could say anything, she said, “One moment please.” I heard her cover the phone with her hand. A few moments later, she asked, “Ghost, where are you?”
“I’m in town,” I said. “As directed.”
She ignored the jab. “We’ve got a name on the second victim,” she said. “Pamela Katherine Kearney. We found her folks. They still live in Anchorage, Alaska. They took her when she was four. Four years old, Ghost.”
I couldn’t find words. But I smoldered plenty. It was a reality that I could not escape. Evidence that another little girl had been torn away from her family and then kept captive like an animal for more than fifteen years. I thought about the myriad terrors she must have felt, the screaming ache for her parents…for someone to come rescue her. Only no one did. Smiling Jack and his accomplice murdered her.
“Ghost?”
“I’m here.”
“Shreveport and Anchorage,” she muttered. “Not exactly sister cities.”
“Smiling Jack went mobile,” I thought aloud. “That’s an angle we’ll need to explore. What else you got?”
“The doc at Panama City Beach Hospital—”
“Doc Shepherd?”
“No,” she said, “an abortion doc off the list Doctor Shepherd gave me, the list of Cain’s Daggers still known to exist. I visited Dr. August Garrett Malcolm.”
“But he’s not Smiling Jack?”
“But he’s not Smiling Jack. He all but rolled out the red carpet for our forensic team. They tested the implement every way possible.”
“Maybe that’s part of his con,” I said, grasping at straws. “Just like he was putting those videos up for years, rubbing it in the face of FBI and everyone else.”
“I wondered the same thing,” Rez said. “But he’s got an airtight alibi. He lectured at a local college, went out with colleagues for cigars and drinks until 3:00 a.m. It all checks.”
I slammed my fist on the steering wheel. “He’s here, Rez,” I growled. “Smiling Jack and his accomplice are here in town somewhere! We’ve got all the photos. We’ve got the camera. We’ve got the video clips. We know the murder weapon. We’ve got two bodies. Why are the killers still alive?”
“You mean free, don’t you? Why are the killers still free?”
I didn’t answer. “You’ll let me know if the Bureau gets closer…if you find out anything new?”
She took too long to answer. “I’m talking to you right now, aren’t I?”
“I’ve…I’ve got to go,” I said. “I need to clear my mind. I need to think.”
We hung up. My focus on the conversation had led me to drive unconsciously. I obeyed all the traffic signs and signals, but I had no idea where I was driving or why. I’d left Front Beach Road behind, that much was clear. Suburban homes sprung up all around me. One street sign told me to slow down. Another street sign told me there was a playground near.
I pulled up close to a rounded corner and put the car in park in the shadow of a huge weeping willow tree. Across the street, a little horde of children chased each other through a sprinkler designed to look like an inverted octopus. Even sixty yards away, I could hear the kids giggling. The average person put in my position would wonder what kind of monster could take a child, hold a child captive, torture, and murder a child? But I don’t wonder.
I know such monsters…all too well. Over a great many years, I have found myself repulsed and shocked, mentally and emotionally wrecked by the savagery of mankind. Unimaginable horrors are possible when there is no concept of how rare and matchless each human life is. And unlike some teenagers desensitized by ultra-violent, photorealistic video games, I never get used to it.
Even now, I can feel the Smiling Jack murders gnawing at my mind, shredding the fringes, and threatening far worse if I don’t wash them away. I crushed my eyes shut, remembering my silver case hidden away in Forneus Felriven’s sepulchral halls. One way or the other, I would finish this mission, and then I would have to face Forneus and his soulcleaving blade. If I did not, if I resolved myself to flee, and resigned myself to live with the images I’d seen and would see…I’m not sure what would happen to me. My greatest fear was that my mind would fracture to such a point that…I would become like the monsters I pursued.
But I would not flee. It was not in my nature. So, I watched the children play and thought. Smiling Jack and his accomplice had taken the young women when they were children, five and four respectively. If the pattern fit their approach to all of their victims, how had they done it? While it was tragically true that children are taken every day, at least half the time the perpetrators are caught, usually within a very short time of the taking. So how did Smiling Jack get away with it?
Sure he was clever…and diabolically patient. By taking the young women as children and not performing the murders until they were adults, he’d had the FBI chasing ghosts. In fact, Smiling Jack had outwitted the FBI at every turn. But still, sooner or later, the law of averages would have caught up with Smiling Jack.
I watched the scene in front of me. The little blond girl in pigtails had picked up the octopus sprinkler and was giving her friends a good soaking. Then, I saw a face appear in the screen window several feet above the playful children. The face disappeared. Moments later, a woman appeared bearing an armful of towels. She wrapped the dark haired girl about the shoulders and kissed her cheek. Then she gave her a gentle shove toward the backyard. The women dropped a towel on top of the towheaded boy and gave his head a good rumpling. While she dried him off, she glanced up and glared at me.
She’d seen me sitting here in the car. She’d wondered why a man would sit in a hot car parked so close to where her children played. Her protective instinct had taken over. And she’d come for her kids. Smiling Jack might have outwitted the FBI, but there was no way he could have totally outperformed parents’ protective instincts, again and again, without ever been seen. Unless he was seen. Unless he was known.