He stood back, surveyed his collection. It was a veritable time capsule of women’s shoe fashions spanning nearly thirty years. Most were, of course, on the most flamboyant fringe of fashion, the shoes no respectable woman would be caught dead wearing. Most were small sizes, as his victims had been. It was a more efficient use of his energy that way. Smaller victims were more easily overpowered. More easily transported. Leaving all his energy for what happened in this room, as it should be.
There were exceptions. His eyes lowered to the bottom shelf, far left. Next to the worn pair of work boots he’d removed from the man who’d dug his pit were a pair of scuffed pumps, black, size eleven. They were plain. Ugly. Matronly, even. They’d been out of style thirty years ago. Which was why they’d been relegated to the church charity bin.
He remembered her digging them from the bin along with the articles of clothing that had been too worn to make decent rags. A few dresses for herself. Trousers for her sons that would be too short for the older, and far too large for the younger. But she didn’t care. Didn’t care that everyone knew every stitch she wore was fished from the charity bin. Didn’t care that her sons were laughingstocks of the entire town.
She’d had no pride. No shame. Nothing but a selfish, unquenchable thirst. He carefully took one of the pumps from the shelf, studied it, remembering. They were scuffed because she’d fallen down all the time.
She’d fallen down all the time because she was drunk. As were the constant stream of paramours she entertained to earn her next bottle. Except a few of them hadn’t been as drunk as she. And a few of them had come with a different price in mind for that next bottle.
His hand clenched into a fist and he abruptly relaxed it. No point in damaging the most valuable of his souvenirs. He remembered the day he’d taken these shoes from her feet, minutes after he’d taken his hands from her throat.
Seconds after he’d taken her miserable life.
He remembered the sight of her swinging from the tree outside the rusted-out trailer she’d had the nerve to call their home. No pride. No shame. Now, no life.
He’d chosen the branch carefully. She’d been a tall woman. That she hadn’t passed those genes to him had often struck her as funny.
He’d laughed about it himself as he’d hoisted her up, left her feet dangling. It had taken more energy than he’d expected, but it had been worth it. Of course tying the noose had been no problem. He’d had months to practice the technique. There hadn’t been much else to do, in juvenile detention. Not much more to do than watch his own back and dream of his hands around her throat.
He’d expected the moral satisfaction, even the thrill as she drew her last breath. What he hadn’t expected was the pure, sexual release. It had caught him off-guard, that first time. He lifted his eyes, surveyed his collection. He’d known to expect it every time that followed.
He looked back at the shoe in his hand. He’d strung her up and left her swinging. No one had questioned that she’d killed herself. Everyone had been relieved that she was finally gone. His only regret was that she’d been dressed in the cast-off Sunday dress she’d pulled from the church charity bin and not like the whore she was. And that he hadn’t had his pit then. He would have enjoyed walking over her any time he chose.
He placed the shoe back on the shelf, straightened it neatly. The next pair of shoes he placed on the shelf would be Rachel Ward’s, victim five of his six, who’d already agreed to meet him tomorrow night. Tonight, he amended.
But the next body into the pit would be Eve’s. Eventually, he’d have her here. She’d be silenced, her worst fear realized. She’d almost died twice. Third time was a charm.
Tuesday, February 23, 4:30 a.m.
Harvey Farmer sat drumming his fingers on his kitchen table when Dell returned, looking cold and tired. “Where have you been?” Harvey snapped.
“Following Jack Phelps, just like we agreed.” There was attitude in his son’s voice that Harvey did not like and he smelled like perfume. Again.
“And what did Phelps do?”
“Went to a bar, then sat outside for a few hours waiting for some guys to come out.”
Harvey’s brows lifted, sniffing a break. “Guys? Really?”
“No, not like that. Phelps is very much into women. He was waiting for these guys to come out so he could write down their license plates. I guess they’re suspects.” Dell dragged his palms down his face. “This plan of yours isn’t working.”
“It will. Be patient.” He jumped when Dell’s hand slammed down on the table.
“I’m done being patient. How long have you followed them, hoping they stumble?”
Harvey cocked his jaw. “Since I put your brother in the ground.”
“And so far? Nothin’.”
“Not nothing. Pages of notes on what they’ve done, who they’ve seen… You’ve been at this three weeks.” Fired by the article that made my son’s murderers look like gods. Harvey had welcomed Dell’s rage. Now he needed to harness it before Dell did something wild. “They’re on a big case. They’ll be under pressure to make an arrest.”
Dell scoffed. “They couldn’t find a crook if they tripped over him.”
“Exactly. When they can’t arrest somebody, they’ll find a scapegoat.”
“Like VJ,” Dell murmured.
“Like VJ,” Harvey repeated. “Here are the pictures I took of Webster tonight.” He handed the memory card from his camera to Dell. “Group them with the ones you took of Phelps and print them out. We’ll regroup in the morning.”
Tuesday, February 23, 6:45 a.m.
“You’re here early,” Jack said, dropping into his chair.
“I had a busy night. Somebody tried to break into Eve’s place last night.”
Jack’s eyes narrowed. “Why didn’t you call me?”
“I tried. Left you a message on your cell. Figured you were just sound asleep. If the unis had found anything, I’d have called your home phone and woke you up.”
Jack frowned at his cell phone. “There is no call from you in my log.”
Noah wanted to tell him to cut the bullshit, but didn’t have the energy. “Maybe you need a new phone,” he said wearily. “I asked Micki to check the area around Eve’s apartment this morning. We’ll see what she finds. Is one of those for me?”
Jack had two full cups from his favorite coffee house. “They were both for me, but you look like you need it more.” He slid a cup across their desks. “What’s that?”
“Eve’s test participants. I’m comparing them against the suicide reports.”
“She gave you the list?”
“I didn’t have to ask twice. So far, no matches. That’s the good news.”
“Bad news is you’ve got a long list and we don’t know who he’s targeting next.”
“It’s not that bad. Eve separated out the heavy users. If he’s luring them to meet him somewhere, it stands to reason that he’d have a better chance of encountering them in the virtual world the more frequently they play.”
“Makes sense to me.”
Noah sat back, pushing the list away for a little while. “So why are you here early?”
“I found Taylor Kobrecki’s pals at a bar last night. The bar was the first number on Kobrecki’s grandmother’s LUDs. She called the minute you left her yesterday.”
“I bet his pals say they haven’t seen him in weeks and Taylor would never hurt a fly.”
“Almost word for word. When I asked their names, they gave me every crank-call name in the book, so I waited for them to leave and copied down license plates. I’ll run their addresses. One of them could be hiding him.” Jack tossed his hat to his desk. “Although if Kobrecki’s IQ is anywhere near his Neanderthal pals’, there’s no way in hell he’s smart enough to have pulled this off.”