Payback (12 page)

“What is his motive? How does he operate? We need to know some of this if we are going to catch him. You said you know where he is and what he does? Does that mean you know who he is going to kill next?”

“Yes, I know,” Trapp said. His voice had become very soft and meek. It sounded like he wanted to cry but frankly had no clue how to do it.

“Who? Tell me who it is?”

“Let me tell you about this man’s motive. You asked that question first. The man is what we refer to as the Cleaner. He does not like messes. To him what constitutes a mess is someone who should be dead but lives on. So he abducts and kills women who have escaped from murderers before. Poor Darla Fields will not know what is coming.”

“Darla Fields is next?”

“No, not yet. She has far too many people watching over her these days. The Cleaner will wait until she is primed for the picking. Sometimes he waits years for the perfect time. He likes for the fear of the past to be so far behind them that it does not even bother them anymore. That way they are almost fresh, but when the thought that someone else is trying to kill them appears before them the fear is twice as intense because they are reliving the first experience along with a brand new form of terror. It’s beautiful. The man is an artist.”

“Ok, so Darla is not the victim, then who is?” Brian demanded.

Trapp paused for a moment before he looked right into Brian’s eyes and smiled.

“Your wife.”

Brian ran out of the room as fast as he could. He picked up the radio and ordered the dispatcher to punch him into the officer who was watching over his wife and family. It took almost five minutes to reach him, and during those minutes Brian felt his heart almost stop in his chest. He was having a full blown panic breakdown. Of course it could be that Trapp was making all of this up, but he wasn’t about to take that chance. He urgently wanted to get his wife out of the house, but he knew that the officer there would be able to keep them safer if they all stayed inside and locked the door.

“Officer Travers,” the voice said on the radio.

“Hey, this is detective Graff.”

“Hey, detective. What can I do for you?”

“Is my family ok?”

The officer seemed alarmed and a bit confused. “Yea, they are fine. Why? What is going ---“

The line was cut dead as Brian clearly heard Travers choke on his last word.

“Travers! Travers pick up!” Brian yelled.

A new voice came on the line just then. “Game over,” it said before disconnecting the frequency.

“Shit! Order several patrol cars to my house now! Anyone in the area!”

Brian ran out the door as fast as he could, hopped into his car and fled away.

The entire trip lasted him about eight minutes when it was usually closer to twenty. He fired up the siren and urged other cars to get out of his way. He kept trying to call Amber on her cell but she was not answering. She had to be there unless she was taking a nap. She did that sometimes in the afternoons. She had not been sleeping too well lately worrying about the Copycat murders, when in actuality she had another murderer to worry about all together. The man had taken out the officer that he had assigned to protect his wife. If he was able to do that so easily then he was more dangerous than Brian had even realized.

Brian arrived on the scene with several back up cars in tow pulling up the rear. He ordered half of them to go around back and the others to come with him. He was not sure exactly how he wanted to proceed, but he decided to just walk in the front door. His wife could very well be dead. There had been plenty of time for the killer to get to her.

Brian kept seeing images of her flashing in his mind, dead, mangled, not breathing. He started to get choked up and forced it back down. Now was not the time to be Brian Graff husband; he had to put his game face on if he had any chance of saving his wife at all. He could not allow himself to become emotionally attached here or it would be a lost cause and he would cause more harm than good. He sniffed in deeply and cleared his mind of everything but the focus that he needed.

He opened the door slowly. The house was dark and silent. He knew that his kids were spending the day at friends’ houses. They had both been spending the summer anywhere but at home it seemed like and for the first time Brian was grateful that they were not home. They would be out of harm’s way.

His first instinct was to call out for Amber but the Cleaner could be anywhere. He was bound to have heard them arrive outside, if he was still here. Maybe he had already killed Amber and now was halfway on his way to Tahiti. Brian groaned silently as his footsteps creaked on the floor. He had never really noticed before just how loud the floors in his house were.

Brian motioned for a few of the guys to stay downstairs while he went upstairs to check things out. He had one officer coming with him. Together they made their way slowly up the stairs. The stairs met the middle of the hallway which had the master bedroom and bathroom on side of the hall and the kids’ bedrooms and the study on the other side. Brian decided to check out the master bedroom first. If Amber was going to hide or if she were taking a nap that would be the place that she would be found.

A bullet whirred past his face and struck the officer behind him square between his eyes. The cop never knew what hit him as he fell to the ground and rolled down the steps all the way to the bottom. His lifeless body crumpled at the bottom of the steps.

A few officers started up the steps.

“No! Stay back!” Brian said as he ducked down on the top two steps hiding behind the heavy bannister.

“That’s a good idea,” came the voice from the bedroom. It was a heavy, thick voice that sounded almost familiar. Brian wanted to rush in to the room and see what was going on. Was the man with his wife? Was she alive or dead?”

“Who are you?” Brian asked.

“It doesn’t matter to you right now,” came the reply.

“Where is my wife?” Brian asked.

“She is safe, for now,” the voice replied.

“How do I know that? Am I just supposed to trust you?”

A second later Amber’s voice filled the air. “Brian, I’m ok. Just do what he says.”

It felt so good to hear his wife’s sweet voice again. Brian felt the biggest weight just lifting off of his chest at that second. He could breathe again. The dizziness he had been dealing with threatening to cause him to pass out was starting to subside as well.

“Amber, it’s going to be ok. I will get you out of this,
honey,” Brian said.

“Brian Graff, I want you to come into the bedroom,” the man’s voice came.

Brian hesitated.

“How do I know you won’t just shoot me?”

“You don’t. But if you don’t follow my orders then I’m going to cut one of your wife’s fingers off for every ten seconds you waste getting in here. Starting now. Ten seconds. Move your ass.”

Brian did not hesitate. He risked it all and ran up the steps and into the bedroom, while telling the other officers to stay put.

He entered the bedroom quickly, his gun raised.

“Stay where you are,” the voice commanded. “And drop the gun.”

Brian sat the gun down on the floor carefully.

The scene was like something out of his own personalized nightmare of a horror movie. Amber was tied to the bed posts by her wrists and her ankles. The look on her face was full of terror. He could see the fear that was eating her alive, but she was being so strong trying to hold on. He was so proud of her. Brian did not tell her that enough. He instantly felt bad for all the times that he had been stressed out or upset about work and he was cranky and took his mood out on her by being less than pleasant. He felt so guilty about it all right now. He swore to himself right then that if they made it out alive from this then he was going to be a much better husband and father. He was getting out of this line of work. It had now put his family in danger.

The voice was coming from a tall man sitting in the corner of the room with a nine millimeter beretta. It took him a second to recognize that the gun was police issue. It was just like his. This man was a cop. This man who had killed who would ever know how many innocent people and he was a cop. The thought made Brian feel absolutely sick all over. He wanted to lie down as the waves of nausea and the faint feelings ran through his mind. This bastard was a disgrace to the badge.

The man was wearing a costume. He was completely covered from head to toe in a black jump suit with a thin hoody which wrapped around a black ski mask. His body language was relaxed and commanding. He knew that he was running the show here and that everyone
was going to do exactly what he demanded. Brian did not care about bringing this psycho to justice right then; all he cared about was keeping his wife and his family safe.

“So, this is what they call a standoff,” the man spoke.

“What do you want?”

“I want to get out of here without any consequences. That is something that even you might not be able to deliver Brian.”

The man knew his name. He had worked with this man. Possibly in the same precinct and the same department.
Who was this son of a bitch who had the
audacity to call himself a police officer?

“I will do what I can to help you here. My wife’s safety is all I care about. Nothing else matters to me in the world.”

“I doubt that, Brian. You are a highly decorated veteran detective on the force. You can’t tell me that bringing me to justice and catching the bad guy does nothing for you.”

“It used to; but I just don’t care anymore. I’m so tired of it all. I’m burnt out; you can ask anybody. I don’t know who you are, and I don’t care. I’m retiring from the force anyway,” Brian said. It felt somewhat cathartic to come clean about everything that was going on with him in front of his wife and this murderer. He was doing it because he wanted to explain to this man that he had no real interest in apprehending him and that he didn’t care about being a cop anymore. He was done.

“Really? Well, I know a thing or two about lying and I have to say that almost sounded genuine,” the man said.

“It is genuine. I don’t care about you or what you’ve done. I stumbled on to you by accident. None of us had any idea that you existed.”

“I know that. Don’t think that I don’t know that. I am too careful to be apprehended. I am a cop and I know every single in and out of police procedure. You can’t catch yourself, right?”

“Right,” Brian nodded.

“That bastard Trapp sold me out. The idiot. I knew he was going to get caught soon. He was too zealous and too careless.”

Brian looked over at Amber who had tears rolling down her face
. Just stay strong baby. This will be over soon enough. I am getting you out of here.

“So, what are we going to do about our little situation here? I never wanted this to happen obviously. Your wife is really good at hiding and it took me way longer to find her than I intended. Otherwise I would not have tried to beat you here once I knew you were coming.”

“Ok, but you don’t need her anymore,” Brian said.

“Well, I needed her before to satisfy myself. Killing is the one thing in this world that makes me feel alive and without it then I have nothing to live for or exist for. I don’t expect you to understand any of that Brian. I still have the need to kill her, but I know right now I can’t really unless I want to fight my way out of the hands of twenty cops. What I do need is for you to get me out of here.”

“How do you suppose I do that? They aren’t just going to stand back and let you out even if I am with you. You are far overestimating my value to them.”

“I don’t think so. They are not going to risk the life of a decorated cop to apprehend me. They don’t even know the extent of what I’ve done, but they are about to.”

“What do you mean? What are you thinking?”

The man stood up just then. “I’m thinking that I take you with me and if anyone comes near us then your wife gets to blow up,”

“What?”

The man opened a bag that was sitting beside him on the floor while still keeping the gun aimed on Brian’s chest. If he moved the bullet would pierce right through his chest.

The man pulled a small laptop out of his bag and sat it down on the nightstand beside the bed. He moved the nightstand just a few feet away from the bed by nudging it slightly. Once satisfied at its location the man opened up the lap top. He typed in something with one hand and then showed the screen to Brian.

The laptop was blank except for a clock in the center of it. The clock was counting down from eight minutes.

“What is that?” Brian asked.

“I have wired this lap top with plastic explosives. When that time runs out the laptop will detonate the bomb inside of it and half of your house will be gone, including your wife right beside it.”

“You can’t do that!”

“I am doing that. I always have a contingency plan. Who do you think schooled good old Mike Trapp? You are welcome by the way.”

“You are sick. You are so sick,” Brian heard himself saying.

“Well, luckily I’m not contagious. Now let’s move.”

“Wait, there has to be another way.”

“There is not. I’m sure your buddies downstairs can get your wife out of here before the bomb explodes or at the very least relocate the bomb. Either way they won’t have time to mess with us,” the man said as he began to nudge Brian with the gun, bumping it into his chest.

Brian knew that there was no reasoning with this man. He turned and started walking in front of the masked maniac towards the door.

“Brian...” Amber said.

“It’s ok, honey. It will be ok,” Brian said.

The man nudged him again and Brian felt the opportunity rising up inside of him. It was a moment that culminated all of the rage he felt at all of the scum he had encountered and had put away in his life. There was no one who could get the drop on him this way. No one was going to terrify his wife and kill no telling how many other people’s wives. Brian was not built to take this sort of thing lying down.