The detective was strapped to the chair with silver duct tape. Her arms, legs, and head were completely immobilized. She had been almost mummified in tape. He had ripped open her shirt and torn off her bra. Then he had begun cutting on her breasts. He tried to imagine that she were Sarah but her breasts were bigger and flabbier than Sarah’s. They looked more like his mother’s, only in a different, darker color. Dale remembered what his father had done to his mother’s breasts on the night he died.
He cut a line from one shoulder to the other, then down her sides and across her belly in a perfect square. He peeled up the edges of the square with the scalpel and began slowly flaying the skin from her torso. He lifted a flap of skin at her shoulder and grabbed it with the pliers, stripping her skin from the muscle and fat like the peel of an orange. He didn’t care if she talked or not. He was having fun now.
Over the course of an hour Dale had excoriated all the skin from Detective Lassiter’s chest. Her mammary glands were a bloody mass of fatty tissue, lobules, and connective tissue. Dale removed the tape from around her mouth and head. Mucus, saliva, and tears drooled down her face onto her exposed muscles and sinews. Her breath stuttered out in jerks and starts, spraying saliva and blood. She was shivering from shock and the loss of blood. She would be dead soon. But not before she told him where Sarah was. He didn’t care if he had to bring her back and torture her all over again.
Dale grabbed Detective Lassiter by the chin and lifted her head until her eyes met his. Her pupils had narrowed to pin dots.
“Tell me where she is.” He ran the scalpel up the detective’s inner thigh all the way to her vulva. “Or I start cutting down there.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
The sky was beginning to darken as Sarah passed Jones Street. Storm clouds rolled in from the south, blanketing the sky. Sarah considered turning back but she felt good. Her lungs felt strong, like she could run forever, and the chances of an actual rainstorm were slim. It only rained two or three weeks out of the year and this was not the season. She decided to keep running.
Tropicana was a long, slow, steady incline, not a steep hill but a gradual ascent that filled your quadriceps with lactic acid and kept the burn going through the entire run. Sarah ignored the persistent burn in her thighs and ran another long block to Rainbow Boulevard. She slowed down for just a moment and checked the clouds above. The sky was completely gray now but still not a drop of rain had fallen. The Garmin began to beep again, urging her on. Sarah took one more glance at the skies, then charged forward. It had been a week since her last run and she had missed it more than she knew. She continued running up Tropicana Avenue another mile. She could see Buffalo ahead, less than a block away.
A black BMW pulled up beside her. Sarah spotted it out of the corner of her eye but ignored it. The Garmin was beeping again, telling her to speed up. She broke into a full sprint for the last block. She knew that she would still have to turn around and run the four miles back to the motel once she reached Buffalo but right now she didn’t care. Pushing herself to her limit felt good.
Sarah reached Decatur Boulevard with her lungs feeling like they were about to burst. She checked her time on her Garmin. It was a personal record. Four miles in thirty-one minutes. She leaned up against the street sign to catch her breath and celebrate her victory. She was just about to begin that long jog back down Tropicana when that same black BMW she had spotted out of the corner of her eye stopped at the corner. An alarm went off in her head too late to escape as the car door opened and Dale stepped out of the BMW aiming a pistol at Sarah’s head.
“Get in the car.”
Sarah looked down Tropicana Boulevard and considered running. The street was packed with traffic. She could take a chance and hope that Dale wouldn’t shoot her in front of so many witnesses. Then she remembered that he was already wanted by the police. There was no longer any need for him to be discreet. If she ran maybe a police car would happen by before he could catch her again. Maybe someone would stop their car and help her. Dale was already coming around the car toward her. It was too late now. He had the gun pointed at her face now.
“If you run I will shoot you dead. Now get in the car.”
He opened the car door and grabbed Sarah by the arm, dragging her inside. Sarah began to scream and punch at Dale. There was blood leaking from Dale’s head and Sarah tried to aim a punch at the wound. Someone shouted something at Dale from a passing car and Sarah hoped that they would call the police, that someone would save her before he got her alone. Sarah felt Dale crack her over the head with the pistol and her legs wobbled. She was thrown into the car and the door was slammed shut behind her. Dale ran around the car and Sarah tried to reach up and lock the door before he could open it. Dale ripped open the door and pushed her back into her seat. He shoved the pistol into her ribs and pulled the BMW back out into traffic.
“Why are you doing this?”
“I don’t know. Shut up. Don’t talk.”
There was a desperation to Dale’s movement that Sarah hadn’t noticed before. This was not the careful, meticulous killer who had bathed her and her husband after murdering them both, washed her sheets, and scrubbed the walls and floor. The impulsive madman who had just snatched her off a busy street in the middle of rush hour was an entirely different breed of killer. Something had changed him.
“You could have gotten away. The police let you go. They didn’t have anything on you. Why did you come back?”
“I said shut the fuck up!” Dale slapped her and Sarah’s head spun.
Sarah knew that she was going to be raped and tortured no matter what she did. There was nothing he could threaten her with. No matter what she did the pain would be the same.
“Why me? You could have any woman you wanted, a woman of your own who would love you. I’m married. Why do you want me?”
Dale turned quickly and Sarah braced for another blow but instead he gritted his teeth and answered her question. His face was twisted in anger and some deep emotional pain.
“Any woman? Is that what you think? I can have any woman? Women hate me. My own mother hated me. This is the only way I have ever gotten anyone to pay attention to me. That’s why God gave me this power, so I wouldn’t be alone, so I could make whores like you love me without violating his law. Thou shalt not kill. I can bring them back.”
Dale smiled smugly, proudly.
“But the Bible also says, ‘Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife.’ I’m married. I have a husband. You’re sinning right now, Dale. You’ve been sinning all along. You have to let me go and turn yourself in. You need help.” Sarah was trying her best to control her panic. Tears were streaming from her eyes.
“It doesn’t matter. God will forgive me. He knows what I feel.”
“What do you feel, Dale?”
Dale’s face twitched. He licked his lips and stared straight ahead through the windshield, avoiding Sarah’s inquisitive eyes.
“Do you love me, Dale? Do you think you actually love me? This isn’t love. You don’t hurt the people you love. This is sick. This is twisted and evil.”
“You have to be quiet now.”