CHAPTER 43
The
color photographs were laid out across the dark twenty-foot-long oak conference room table, which was stained with coffee rings and cigarette burns from years of use. Marcus made sure the best photos were directly under the canned lights in the ceiling—the better for Morry to scrutinize—which was exactly what he was doing.
"Wha
t the hell is this?" Morry asked, pointing to the photo of John and Megan in John's front yard the morning his home was searched.
"I said the same thing when I saw that
," Marcus said.
"So what the hell is it?"
"She's handing him her business card."
"Oh," said Morry.
"But you should have seen the whole thing," Marcus said. "The detective's hand lingered in his and she was looking up at Dr. Randall with this come-hither smile."
"Come hither?
" Morry said. “What the hell do you know about a come hither? You're too damn young. You'd squirt your panties before a girl even got close to you. Come hither, my ass. She's a detective for Christ sakes!"
Marcus argued, "Call it what you want, Morry, she was giving him some sort of message, you could tell by the way he watched her walk away
. He stared at her." Marcus nodded down the table and said, "Look at the rest of them."
Morry took his time, scanning the rest of the photographs, with Marcus adding his two cents whenever Morry asked for it, but
Marcus knew the payoff was coming far down at the end. Morry was taking his sweet time and Marcus almost couldn't stand it anymore. Finally, Marcus backed up and waited.
Then it came.
"What the fuck is this?" Morry yelled.
Morry turned, his eyes wide, staring back at Marcus, as if he needed the sexually
inexperienced young man to explain the ways of life to him. Without looking at the photograph, Marcus said, "I said the same thing."
"They're fucking kissing," Morry
said.
"Yup," Marcus
said.
"Why the fuck is a homicide detective kissing th
is former prime suicidal suspect?" Morry said.
"That's the sixty
-four thousand dollar question, isn't it?"
Morry was still staring back at Marcus, but Marcus gave another chin nod at the table, causing Morry to turn back and proceed down the conference table
. Once he got to the very end he stopped again, staring at one photo in particular. Again, Marcus knew exactly which one it was and once again Morry turned back to face Marcus, this time he held the photo in his hand, waving it in the air.
"You're just full of surprises aren't you?"
Morry said.
Marcus couldn't get the shit-eating grin off his face
. He finally stepped forward and took the photo from Morry, laying it back down on the table.
"I almost shit my pants when I saw him walk up.
" Marcus said. "They sat there for about ten minutes. The detective did most of the talking."
Morry asked, "Was he yelling at him?"
"Didn't seem to be," Marcus said, "but I know what you mean. Looks like it in the photo. But I was too far away to hear the voices, so I can't say for sure."
Morry turned back to face the table,
put a Camel in between his lips, and snapped open his silver lighter, lighting up in the conference room and sending a curl of smoke overhead. Marcus looked around, then up at the overhead sprinkler, thinking of the running pool all the reporters had going on whether Morry would set off the fire alarms,
again,
before the end of the year.
He made a mental note to recheck the odds.
Morry pulled the cigarette out of his mouth
, turned, and pointed at Marcus, stabbing the air between them with his cigarette while he spoke. "This is what you're going to do. If you're right about what you've told me, and I think you are, you're going to keep following this guy Randall. Wherever he goes. Whatever he does. You follow him. Keep taking pictures. Camp out on his street. Call him or stop by enough to keep your feet in the door. But not too much. Be his friend."
Morry turned back
to the photos, took another pull on his cigarette, blew out the smoke. He looked down at the photo of Detective Bell, bent down, his large frame looming over Dr. Randall sitting on the bench, index finger pointed at the doctor's face, and said, "My boy, you might be partying with Mr. Pulitzer this time next year."
CHAPTER 44
The sex started at the local Coffee Bean bathroom at 9:15 a.m. that morning. The coffee house was always crowded on a Saturday morning with people running to appointments and Bible meetings, complete with a caffe latte, no foam. Mothers would rush in, or send in their daughters, to grab their four-dollar drink of choice before running to the soccer game or the shopping mall. The coffee house was tucked into an L-shaped center, between a Supercuts and a Verizon store, and today's crowd was in full swing. The line was seven deep; with five people standing off to one side waiting for their blended drink. The latest Sting CD played.
Megan was already there when John entered
. She caught his eye, turned toward the back hallway, and entered the women's bathroom. She was wearing a beige sweater that clung to her breasts, a short, loose-fitting navy-blue skirt, and high heels. No stockings. No panties. Once inside, Megan threw her right high-heeled shoe onto the handicap bar along the wall and leaned forward over the toilet, facing the corner, gripping the bars with both hands. John stepped in the room, locked the door, stepped to Megan, dropped his pants, and entered her from behind. She was already wet. He was already hard. After two orgasms for Megan and one for him, they walked out past the unknowing patrons. They drove separately, John following Megan, to Jack's Independent Bookseller half a mile away on Hawthorne Boulevard. Once they'd parked, Megan exited her car and walked past John's car while he was still inside. She dropped her keys, and knowing that John was watching, locked her knees and bent over to pick them up…slowly.
Inside the store, Megan hit the magazine racks and kept one eye on the front door, again catching John's gaze after he stepped inside
. Once she knew he was coming, she waited for him to round the corner and when he did, she slowly lifted her skirt, showing him her shaved vagina.
A fiftyish-looking man stood behind Megan, flipping through a
Car and Driver
magazine, totally oblivious to the ongoing sex charade between the highly skilled homicide detective presently working the most talked-about serial killer case in state history and the once suicidal emergency room doctor, standing just three feet to his right. They continued cruising through the bookstore, from automotive to Harry Potter, pretending not to know each other, flashing, posing, opening their mouths, and letting their tongues linger. As they moved through the store, they unknowingly pulled into the "Relationships" and "Self -Help" aisle.
***
It was John's plan to ask her about Russell the very next time he spoke to her, but she had left instructions on where to find her on his cell phone and made it clear they were going to have sex. His mind said no. His dick said,
Are you crazy?
His dick won.
John found a book on sexual positions and began flipping through the pictures, looking for one to show Megan. Maybe something they could try in the bookstore bathroom or maybe behind the bookstore in the backseat of his car. Never in his life had he had so much fun with a woman. Not until he'd met Megan had he ever had the kind of free-form, anything goes sex. Not even with Paulette. But he didn't want to think about her—no, he wouldn't think about her. Not now. He didn't want it to stop. He didn't know where it was going, and for now he didn't care. He was lost in whatever world it was and he didn't want to find his way out. He was content to float…and he'd worry about where he landed sometime later.
But there was still the question of Russell.
They were facing the same shelf of books and John could see from the corner of his eye that Megan was staring intently at a book near the top right corner of the shelf. But she stood very still, for a very long time. John finally turned to face her, and that's when he noticed the tear in her left eye. She was completely still, just staring upward when she finally acknowledged John's presence beside her. She quickly brushed the tear from her eye, turned away from him, and disappeared around the corner. John returned his book to the shelf, took three short steps to his right, and looked up to where Megan had been looking.
What was she looking at
?
Then he saw it, spotting the title on the book spine
. He immediately knew why she was crying. It confirmed what he had suspected…but hadn't wanted to admit. He knew, but he didn't want to know. Didn't want to ask. Asking would be like a kid asking Dad how much it had cost him to fly the whole family to Disney World. Dad didn't want to think about it and if you really wanted to keep having fun, you just didn't bring it up. But John knew that what he had with Megan was now over. It would never be the same again. Not now, because now, he had to ask the question. He'd have to get her alone. Someplace safe and non-threatening.
This could get ugly.
Russell would have to wait. To ask about both would be too much for her to take at one time. He'd ask her to his place or maybe just park at the beach in his car. That might be a good place. They could talk for as long as she wanted. Turn off the cell phones and just listen to the sound of the waves in the background. No matter where he broached the subject, he'd have to do it soon. This wasn't something they could ignore. She saw the book, and she'd cried.
He saw the book, and knew why
. John reached up and pulled the book down, turned it over in his hands, opened the back cover, and read about the author.
Yes, she was telling her story. How she'd made it through.
The author's name was Jennifer Moore, PhD in Psychology. The book was titled,
Sex Addiction: Battling the Affliction and Coming Out Whole on The Other Side
.
He heard Detective Bell's words ring in his ears
…
You're
just another issue, John.
CHAPTER 45
"Where have you been?"
Gerald watched as Megan dropped her purse on her desk and turned on her computer
. After a quick good-bye to John, Megan had dashed home, showered while crying her eyes out, then got dressed and drove herself to work. It was two forty-five in the afternoon. She'd worked on her excuse as she drove in.
The cleaners, then to the tire store for new tires
.
Forgot to turn on her cell phone
. No, that never works.
Tire store in a bad cell area
. No coverage. What could she do about that?
Needed the new tires
. No, he might check the tires. Brakes. New brakes. Can't see those.
"At the cleaners, then g
ot new brakes. Mine were squealing." Megan flopped down in her chair and slid the mouse left to right until her monitor sprang to life.
"Did you have any plans to call in?" asked Bell.
"I couldn't."
"Couldn't or wouldn't
? Everyone needs to pull their weight, Megan. I got the mayor, the city council, and all the fucking residents of this city breathing down my neck, and my partner,
excuse me
, is out getting new brakes. If you should need a manicure, please let me know so I can call a council meeting to brief them ahead of time. I wouldn't want anyone thinking we don't know what each of us is doing on this little ol' serial killer case you're supposed to be working on."
Megan closed her eyes to hold back the tears
, but they came anyway. She shuddered, keeping a grip on the computer mouse and her face toward the screen.
Don't turn around
.
Don't let him see
.
She wanted to shout,
Get the fuck away from me you fucking fat ass slob.
But she didn't
. She couldn't. Not to him. And certainly not here. She swallowed, and took a deep breath, then said, "There's no coverage over there. I really need to find another place to get my car worked on, but I trust that guy so much. He's good."
Bell sniffed at the remark and let an
I bet
slip out of his mouth as he turned way and headed back inside his office, slamming the door behind him.
Megan just stared at her monitor, still straining to come to life after a full minute
. They were working with six-year-old computers and the waiting was killing her now. The more time she spent waiting, the more time her mind had to wander, not knowing what to do next.
Her mind wasn't ready to turn off what she had seen at the bookstore
, yet she couldn't sit there and do nothing. She needed something to get her going. Megan stood, grabbed her purse, and walked down the hall and into the bathroom. She dropped her purse on the counter and stared at herself in the mirror. She had to get out. She just had to get out. But how? How to escape. How to make it all go away.
She thought of John, wondering what he was doing right now
. Probably back home. He must have looked at the book. He's not dumb. Why did she turn down that aisle? Why
that
one? It could have been any other aisle, any other topic. She was having so much fun with him…more than she'd had with any of the other guys. But it was more than that. He understood her. There was something between them that made her feel so much more comfortable with him. She couldn't point it out or give it a name, she just knew it was there and she wondered if he felt the same way. But now, after seeing the book, what would he do?
God don't let it be over
.
Please, don't let it be over.
She flipped the cover of her purse over and dug her hand inside, pulling out her pill bottle. She popped open the top and poured two pills on to her palm, then popped them into her mouth, grabbed her hair with one hand, and dipped her head down to drink from the faucet. She would have to get things straight.
Focus time
.
Do your job
.
Find
the killer.
That's job number one right now
.
Find
the killer.
Who is he
?
Then what
?
"Then what, Megan," she said.
It felt, at that very moment, as if the killer had been around for her entire career. Like she was going on year twenty chasing the Bedroom Killer, and in that time he'd killed fifty young girls in their beds.
The weight.
She tried to imagine the killer being caught. But what then? Would John still want to meet?
Not now Megan, she thought
. Having the killer to track was her number one priority and she did very little else these days. This guy kept her on some sort of straight path…maybe not straight enough, but definitely on the road. Without him to concentrate on, she would go over the edge, and she knew it. She needed something to fixate on when she wasn't having casual sex with John or the three other guys on her short list. John didn't know about the others. But ever since John, there hadn't been any of the others. She was monogamous…for the time being. It's not as if no one else gets murdered and there are no other cases. But this one was different. She had never focused so strongly for such a long time as she had with this case.
But John changed everything.
"Focus Megan," she told herself.
She couldn't stop thinking about him
. Without the case, and without John, there would only be…she didn't want to think about that. The door suddenly sprang open and caught Megan by surprise as if she were caught smoking in the high school bathroom instead of trying to figure out her life. The woman, a secretary from up front named Linda, nodded with a thin smile and entered a stall. Megan grabbed her purse and before walking out, she took one last look in the mirror, feeling that she had no connection with the woman staring back at her and not sure how she'd ever again find the one she once knew. She exited the bathroom and returned to her desk, where she found a file folder that someone had set on her keyboard.
"That's forensics on the
hair we found on the bat. Eric says they're still working on DNA," Andy said from somewhere behind her. Megan turned to face him.
"Thanks," she said
. But instead of continuing the conversation, she turned back around, opened the file folder, and began reading the report. Three hairs, one brown, two black, taken from the business end of the bat that was found in John's car. The brown hair was from John when Karen Sharp bludgeoned him through his car window, and the black ones were almost undoubtedly from the killer when Karen Sharp hit him from behind. She would make copies for John. Just because of what happened today didn't mean she was not going to still work with him and give him copies of the files. Besides, if the sex was over, this was the one way she could still be in his life, if he still wanted her or still wanted to be a part of the investigation. She hoped so…
please God.
She grabbed the file and walked the twenty feet to the copy machine, pulled the six
-page report out of the file, and set it in the tray. She pressed the green copy button and the machine hummed to life. It clicked and grabbed each sheet, one at a time, and sucked them in. The warm copies spit out the other side, and Megan reached for them. But Gerald’s hand got there first. Megan gasped and jumped back. Bell stood next to her, holding the copies, flicking his eyes from the copies to Megan and back again.
"Why do you need copies?"
"I always make copies."
"Why
? Everything goes in the murder book or central files. That's where everything goes, you know that. Everything's in one place."
Megan snatched the copies from his hand and stalked past him saying, "I like having my own.
" Bell turned to follow her.
"In my office
. Now!"
Megan stopped in her tracks
. Bell walked past her without saying a word and without looking back. He entered his office, with its louvered windows, which he proceeded to twist shut. Megan set the file on her desk and shuffled into Bell's office. Bell closed the door behind her.
The entire scene was witnessed by Andy. Kennedy was out or he would have seen it too. There were others in the area, but not close enough and not as deeply involved in this homicide investigation. They were peripheral players. Seeing Detective Ash walk into Bell's office wouldn't mean a thing to them.
But it did to Andy…
which is why he stood up, grabbed some paperwork, his coat, stuffed his favorite pen into his shirt pocket, and left the station—and Megan, behind.