Authors: Cody McFadyen
He looks the same as he did before we went to bed, not a wrinkle in his suit. He is fully awake and alert. He has brewed coffee, and he gives me a cup.
“Thanks,” I say.
“Are you going to be leaving soon?”
“In about a half hour. I need to make a call first.”
“Let me know.” He regards me for a moment, sphinxlike, until a smile plays on the edge of his lips.
I raise an eyebrow at him. “What?”
“Just thinking about last night.”
I look at him. “It was great,” I say, quiet.
“Yeah.” He cocks his head. “You know, you never asked me if I was seeing anyone already.”
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“I figured if you were, last night wouldn’t have happened. Was I wrong?”
“Nope.”
I look down at my coffee cup. “Listen, Tommy, I want to say something about last night. About what you said. About not being sure if it would go anywhere or not. I want you to know I meant what I told you. If it doesn’t go anywhere, it really will be okay. But . . .”
“But if it does, that’s okay too,” he replies. “Is that what you were going to say?”
“Yeah.”
“Good. ’Cause I feel the same way.” He reaches out a hand, strokes my hair. I lean into it for a second. “I mean that, Smoky. You’re a hell of a woman. And I’ve always thought that.”
“Thanks.” I smile at him. “So what do we call it? ‘A one-night stand with potential’ ?”
He drops his hand, laughs. “I like that. Let me know when you’re ready to go.”
I nod and walk away, feeling not just good, but something even more important: comfortable. However it goes, neither Tommy nor I will have to regret last night. Thank God.
I go back upstairs, nursing my coffee like it’s the elixir of life. Which, with the hours I’ve been keeping, isn’t far from the truth. It’s only eight-thirty, but I feel certain that Elaina is an early riser. I dial the number.
Elaina answers. “Hello?”
“Hi. It’s Smoky. Sorry about last night. How is she?”
“She seems happy. She’s still not talking, but she smiles a lot.”
“How is she doing at night?”
Silence. “She was screaming in her sleep last night. I woke her up and cuddled her. She was fine after that.”
“Ah, jeez. I’m sorry, Elaina.” I feel parent’s guilt at this. While I was howling at the moon, Bonnie was screaming at the past. “You have no idea how thankful I am for this.”
“She’s a child who’s been hurt and needs help, Smoky. That’s never a burden in our home, and never will be.” Her words are simple factual statements, meant from the heart. “Do you want to speak to her?”
My heart skips a beat. I realize that I do. Very much. “Please.”
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“Hang on for a moment.”
A minute later, Elaina comes back on the phone. “She’s here. I’m going to hand her the phone now.”
Fumbling sounds and then I hear the faint sound of Bonnie breathing.
“Hi, honey,” I say. “I know you can’t talk back, so I’ll just talk to you. I’m really sorry I didn’t come get you last night. I had to work late. When I woke up this morning and you weren’t here . . .” My voice trails off. I hear her breathing. “I miss you, Bonnie.”
Silence. More fumbling noises, followed by Elaina’s voice. “Hold on, Smoky.” She speaks away from the phone. “You have something you want to say to Smoky, sweetheart?” More silence. “I’ll tell her.” Talking to me now: “She gave me a big smile and hugged herself and pointed to the phone.”
My heart clenches tighter. I don’t need a translation for that one.
“Tell her I just did the same thing, Elaina. I have to go, but I’ll be by this evening to get her. No more sleepovers if I can help it. Not for a while, at least.”
“We’ll be here.”
I sit for a moment after hanging up, staring at nothing. I am aware right now of all the layers of emotion I am feeling, the obvious and the subtle. I have strong feelings for Bonnie. Feelings of protectiveness, tenderness, a burgeoning love. These are fierce, real. There are other feelings whispering around, though. Tumbling through me like dry leaves, padding on quiet, shadow feet. One is annoyance. That I can’t just be happy about my night with Tommy. It is faint but has its own strength. The selfishness of a very small child who doesn’t want to share. Don’t I deserve some happy time, it whispers, petulant?
And there is the voice of guilt. It is a smooth voice, oil and snakes. It asks only one question, but it’s a powerful one: How dare you be happy when she isn’t?
Recognition shivers through me. I’ve heard these voices before, all of them. Being Alexa’s mom. Being a parent is not a one-note thing, a single-act play. It’s complex, and it contains both love and anger, selflessness and selfishness. Times you are breathless and overwhelmed at the beauty of your child. Times you wish, for just a moment, that there was no child at all.
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I’m feeling these things because I’m becoming Bonnie’s mom. This brings a new guilt voice, one of rebuke and misery: How dare you love her? Don’t you remember?
Your love brings death.
Rather than bringing me down, this voice makes me angry. I dare, I reply, because I
have
to. That’s being a parent. Love gets you through most of it, duty gets you through the rest.
I want Bonnie to be safe, and have a home, and that feeling
is
real. I dare the voices to respond. They don’t.
Good.
It’s time to go to work.
The door to the office flies open, and Callie enters. She’s wearing sunglasses and clutching a cup of coffee.
“Don’t talk to me yet,” she growls. “I’m not well caffeinated.”
I sniff the air. Callie always has the best coffee. “Mmm . . .” I say.
“What is that? Hazelnut?”
She moves away, clutching the coffee close. One side of her mouth raises in a snarl. “Mine.”
I walk over to my purse, reach inside, and pull out a package of small chocolate donuts. I see Callie’s eyebrows shoot up. I wave the donuts.
“Oh, look, Callie. Yummy chocolate donuts. Mmm, mmm, good.”
Emotions war across her face in something just short of a nuclear conflict. “Oh, fine,” she says, scowling. She grabs the cup on my desk, filling it halfway with her coffee. “Now give me two of those donuts.”
I pull two out of the wrapper, moving them toward her as she pushes the coffee cup toward me. When the two meet, she snatches the donuts as I grab the cup. The hostages have been exchanged. She sits down at her desk, gobbling the donuts, while I sip from the cup. Heavenly.
Callie sips her coffee and eats her donuts, and I feel her gaze on me. Thoughtful and piercing at the same time, even through the sunglasses.
“What?” I ask.
“You tell me,” she murmurs, taking another bite from a donut.
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Jesus, I think. Is that old myth true? About it showing if you got laid?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
She continues to look at me through her sunglasses, giving me a big, Cheshire-cat smile. “Whatever you say, honey-love.”
I decide to ignore her.
Leo, Alan, and James all arrive fairly close to one another. Leo looks like he’s been hit by a truck. James looks like he always does.
“Gather round,” I say. “Time for a coordination meeting.
“Leo and James—where do we stand on the user name and password search?”
Leo rubs a hand through his hair. “We reached every company, and all are cooperating.” He checks his watch. “I actually spoke to the last one a half hour ago. We should have all the results within an hour.”
“Let me know the moment you have anything. Callie, where did we end up on the DNA?”
“Gene really put some feet to the fire, honey-love. He told me he’ll have results by the end of the day. Meaning, if there is DNA and he’s on file, we’ll know who it is by dinner.”
Everyone pauses at this, considering. The idea that we could have the face of one of our monsters before it gets dark. Could have one or both in custody before the day is over.
“Wouldn’t that be a hoot?” Alan murmurs.
“No kidding,” I reply. “In the meantime, when did Dr. Child say he’d be ready to see me?”
“Anytime after ten,” Callie replies.
“Good. Callie and Alan—follow up with Barry and see what’s happening with CSU processing the rest of the Charlotte Ross crime scene.”
“Sure thing, honey-love.”
“I’m going to see Dr. Child.” I look around at everyone. “We are now officially hot on his trail, people. Let’s keep moving. Speed and momentum are everything.” I look at my watch and stand up. “Let’s go.”
It’s time to cast another net.
*
*
*
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I knock on Dr. Child’s door before opening it. He’s seated behind his desk, reading a thick file. He looks up when I poke my head in and smiles.
“Smoky. Good to see you. Come in, come in.” He indicates the chairs in front of his desk. “Please sit down. I’ll just need a moment to refer to my notes. Fascinating case.”
I sit, and I watch him as he reads the papers in front of him. Dr. Child is in his late fifties. White-haired, with glasses and a beard. He looks like he is in his sixties. He always seems tired, and his eyes have a haunted look to them that never goes away, not even when he laughs. He’s been peering into the minds of serial killers for almost thirty years. Will I look like that, I wonder, twenty years from now? He’s the only person I trust more than James and myself to have useful insights on what drives the monsters. He nods to himself and looks up. Leans back in his chair. “You and I have collaborated before, Smoky. So you know that I tend to natter on. I imagine I’ll do a fair amount of that now. Do you mind?”
“Not at all, Doctor. Please.”
He steeples his fingers under his chin. “I’m going to address this as applying to a single individual. The ‘Jack Jr.’ persona is our primary, and dominant, personality. Do you agree?”
I nod.
“Good. What we have here can be one of two things. The first is possible, but, I feel, improbable. That he is faking all of it. That his claims of being a descendant of Jack the Ripper are a part of an act, designed to throw you off his trail. I feel this view is overly paranoid and unproductive.
“The second is the most probable and is highly, highly unusual. What we are talking about is a case of nurture versus nature. A kind of longterm brainwashing. Wherein someone spent a very long time imprinting our ‘Jack Jr.’ with the identity he has assumed. In my opinion, this would have to have started from a very young age to be this successful. It’s probable that this was done by one, or both, of his parents.
“Most serial killers, we find, have similar histories. This usually involves abuse from a very young age. It could be physical, it could be sexual, often it is both. The result of this is rage, and it is a rage that they cannot express against their abuser, someone larger and stronger than
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they are, someone in a position of emotional trust and authority. The abuser is almost always a father or a mother. The abused loves this person and feels certain that the abuse must be justified. Caused by something they have done wrong.
“Rage must have an outlet. Without an immediate target, it is channeled by them, almost invariably in the same three ways. First, in violence against themselves: chronic bed-wetting. Then in violence against their environment: the setting of small fires. Finally, escalating in violence against living things: torturing and killing small animals. Once they are adults, this leads them to the logical conclusion: the infliction of harm against other human beings.
“All of this is, of course, an oversimplification. Human beings are not robots, and no one mind is the same as the other. Not all of them wet their beds, set fires, or kill small animals. The abuse is not always from a father, or a mother. But over time, the trends that we have found make this oversimplification more or less accurate.”
He leans back, looking at me.
“There are exceptions. They are rare, but they do exist. They are the argument for those that feel nature is the explanation. Killers who came from decent homes and decent parents. Bad seeds. No apparent reason or explanation for what they do.” He shakes his head. “Why does it have to be one or the other? I have always felt, and many agree, that it can be both. Nature and nurture. Of course, nurture, as I said, tends to be the most prevalent and observable cause.” He taps on the report in front of him. “In this instance, the variables abound. He says he wasn’t abused physically or sexually. That he didn’t set fires or torture small animals. That may not be true. Perhaps he is in denial. But if he’s not, then he is something new. He is a serial killer created from scratch. Someone who has been indoctrinated so heavily and for so long into a belief system that it has become a certainty for him. If that is true, he would be a very, very dangerous man. He won’t have the injuries to the psyche caused by sexual or physical abuse. He won’t have the low self-esteem these things cause.
“He would be able to operate at an extremely high level of rationality. He would have no difficulty assimilating himself into society. Indeed, he might have been trained to do just that.
“Jack Jr. would be doing what he does with the idea that it is his
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destiny. What he was born to do. He wouldn’t consider it wrong. Because he has been told just the opposite from the moment he could understand the spoken word.”
Dr. Child looks at me. “He has fixated on you because he needs this to complete the fantasy. He stated as much himself, that Jack the Ripper must be chased, preferably by a brilliant detective. He has chosen you for this. An astute choice.”
He leans forward, tapping the report again. “The truth about the contents of the jar he sent you, the fact that they were bovine and not human, as he seems to think, this could be your most potent weapon. It is a symbol of everything he believes. He has always accepted it as truth. If he were to find out that this symbol is a lie, and always has been . . . it could shatter him. Could bring the world he’s crafted tumbling down.”