I walked to the dry erase board at the front of the room. “It didn’t hit me until I read the dedication page of Eight in October about a half hour ago.”
I grabbed a blue marker and wrote each of the eight women’s names on the board: Ingrid Grayer, Bethany Eggers, Amber Osgood, Ginny Farth, Deana Farwell, Shelly Regginald, Amy Elles, and finally Sarah Yeirs.
I circled the first letter of each woman’s last name, spelling out G-e-o-f-f-r-e-y. I turned around and stared at the four frozen faces. “Tristen wanted to cause Geoffrey more anguish with each killing. He wanted his brother to know he was responsible for these women’s deaths. These women weren’t Tristen’s victims, Geoffrey was.”
I wrote Jennifer Peppers’ name on the board and circled the P. “I nearly killed him, I nearly ended his game.”
Underneath the P, I added, r-e-s-c-o-t-t. “It appears Tristen has an insatiable appetite for death and I’m next on his list.”
Chapter 17
We broke huddle at noon. Gleason and Gregory had an appointment with the crime scene. Caitlin had an appointment with the Penobscot County medical examiner. Conner had an appointment to get fitted for his Fecal Barometer Internship uniform. I had an appointment with Alex Tooms, a hammer, and her tape recorder. The task force was scheduled to reconvene at 3:00 p.m.
It appeared as though Alex’s little article had created quite a stir and there was a barrage of news vans in the parking lot. It took me five minutes to get to my car and fifteen to get to the Pulitzer Prize runner-up’s stately lake house. I pulled up to Alex’s gate and eighty-three seconds later, I kid you not, I once again applied pressure on the gas pedal and pulled through.
Alex’s Jeep was parked where it’d been earlier, and I mentally prepared myself for some ass-kicking. I had to rap on the door with my fist (seeing as how the pretentious scribe didn’t have a doorknocker) which was pulled inward seconds later. Alex had her hair back in a ponytail and was clad in charcoal sweat pants and a huge Boston College hooded sweatshirt.
Uh-oh, of all the outlandish fetishes out there, mine was as simple as a woman in sweat bottoms and a hoodie. Beats a cankle fetish, I guess.
Alex smiled and said, “Don’t be too hard on me.”
I was optimistic her saying “hard on” was just a coincidence and said, “How could you be so reckless? Your little article has jeopardized our entire case, not to mention the fact you used Jennifer’s name. What if someone from her family stumbled on the article? Did that ever enter your little bird brain?” I was going to add dummy-head, but I didn’t want to play my ace too soon.
She didn’t blink an eye. “I don’t lie to my readers. People don’t want to hear John Doe, they want to hear John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt. Plus, in defending myself, I figured you would have called the victim’s family before this article even went to print. Correct me if I’m wrong, but this woman was at one point your bride-to-be?”
Damn, she was right. I should have contacted Jennifer’s parents last night. I changed the subject, “That’s beside the point. You weren’t privy to that information. I want to see that tape recorder.”
“Sure.”
I followed Alex through a series of turns and finally into a large study-slash-library. The longest wall, serving as the front of the house, was covered in row after row of hardback novels. There was an espresso machine in the far left corner next to a pair of maroon love seats snuggled up to an old brass fireplace.
Alex went to a large cherry wood desk with a large fern at each corner and I heard a drawer roll out of bed. After fiddling for a couple seconds, she extracted the tape recorder and handed it to me, “There you go. Is this going to be Exhibit A at my trial?”
I rolled my eyes at her and stared down at the tape recorder. The sleek chrome contraption was equipped with more than twenty buttons and I asked Alex, “You steal this from James Bond?”
She plopped up on her desk as did I, sending a wave of fire through my gluteus maximus. Alex laughed and said, “How’s your butt feel?”
Somewhere between a bee sting and a fraternity paddling. I kept this to myself. “Don’t try to change the subject. You have a remote control for this thing or what?”
“Nope.”
“So what did you do? It was off when I took it, and off when I gave it back.”
She took the recorder. “You can program a time frame you want it to run. I programmed it to start recording one minute after I turned it off and run for ten minutes.”
Alex showed me the simplicity of the operation and I asked, “Didn’t you think I would hear it turn on?”
She clicked down the record button and the tape began rolling without the slightest sound. She hit Stop and said, “Never leave home without it.”
I popped the tape out of the recorder and read in Alex’s scrawl, “Oct. 1, 11:30 PM.”
I put the tape in my pocket and asked, “Is every journalist as skilled in the art of deception as you?”
“No. But mine is in the pursuit of the truth.” She grabbed my chin and turned it toward her. “Still, I’m sorry. You trusted me and I abused that trust. I won’t use you for my story ever again.” She kissed me on the cheek.
Well, there went another good grudge.
It was almost three, and it appeared as though I was going to be late to yet another meeting. I pulled up to the Federal Building at 3:15 to a buzzing parking lot, whereby, the news vans had mated and reproduced. It took me close to ten minutes and a hundred “No comments” before I found the revolving door.
There was a healthy chance my mangy Van Dyke would be paraded all over the eleven o’ clock news. Maybe I should have shaved or at least worn underwear.
I opened the door to the conference room and before it was half open, Gregory’s exasperating tongue spat, “You’re late.”
“No, I’m forty-five minutes early.” I’d planned on being an hour late.
I sat down next to Conner, who was now clad in a navy blue suit and looking all the part of the asshole agent. Caitlin slid me a dossier across the table and said, “I met with the Penobscot County medical examiner, nothing out of the ordinary. The eyes on the wall were Jennifer’s.”
It’s an ugly day when you can use the phrase “nothing out of the ordinary” in regards to a women who has been raped, beaten, dismembered, and turned into chicken feed. For some reason the fact the eyes were Jennifer’s came as a relief. If they weren’t hers then there was a fair chance they belonged to Tristen’s next victim. Or as I’d started thinking in terms of Mrs. R.
I opened the folder and skimmed over Jennifer Pepper’s autopsy report. I asked Gleason, “Anything from the crime scene jump out at you?”
Gleason shook his head, “Nope. We talked to your neighbors and no one said they saw anything conspicuous. Not that anyone can see your house in the first place, but no one reported seeing any odd vehicles or such. Zilch.”
“Did you ask them about boats?”
Gregory scoffed, “Why would we do that?”
I leaned forward in my seat, “Because my house backs up to a huge body of water called the Atlantic Ocean. Do you find it infeasible for someone to dock their boat on the beach and drag a woman into my house? Do you find that fucking infeasible?”
He didn’t respond and Caitlin said, “I don’t think we’re going to get any anywhere on this sitting on our asses.”
Caitlin was right, the five of us weren’t going to accomplish anything sitting around a giant coffee table playing The View when we should be playing The Task Force. I stood up and was out the door in a matter of seconds. There were a couple neighbors who I wanted to chat with personally. It’s not that I didn’t have faith in Gleason and Gregory’s interviewing skills. It’s that I didn’t trust them.
There were two squad cars parked in my lawn and one of the occupants tried to stop me from entering. His partner notified him the house was well within my jurisdiction a
nd he let me pass with minimal confrontation.
The house felt odd, like it was a set in a movie and the cast and crew were out to lunch. I went into the kitchen, grabbed a white garbage bag from beneath the sink and walked upstairs. I ducked under the crime scene tape cordoning off Lacy’s room and straightened. The air flooding my nostrils smelled awful, like the Gingerbread Man’s cremation. I wrinkled my nose, more at the sight of the blood soaked mattress than the stale odor.
The blood on the bed was lighter in some places than others and there was a distinct outline of where one of Jennifer’s hands had rested and another that looked remarkably like a set of shoulders.
I stuffed the garbage bag full of Lacy’s clothes, a couple pairs of her shoes, and circled the room waiting for the Clue God to whap me on the head with a stick. I had no such luck and found myself situated in front of a long wall mirror hanging near Lacy’s bed. I took an overview of myself in the mirror: my clothes looked like shit and I had five days’ worth of stubble growing. I ran my hand through the coarse cinnamon follicles and decided it was in my best interest to shave.
I turned to check the profile of my budding beard (I was already having doubts about shedding it) and immediately saw my head had been blocking the reflection of Lacy’s lighthouse painting. A great painting is like lasagna, it takes a couple days for all the flavor to soak in. I was admiring the painting when whap.
I turned from the mirror and walked toward the wall. Eight inches below Lacy’s painting were the remnants of Jennifer’s eyes’ last resting place. Blood was caked to the wall in about a three-inch diameter, but the portion of wall where the eyes had touched the wall remained predominantly white. Within each of these havens was a small black hole, an artifact from where each nail had been driven, and the combined illusion was of a set of glaring eyes. It was creepy, super creepy to be honest, but I couldn’t break away from the marvel.
I walked back around the room trying to place what brought about the whap, but nothing registered. I guess sometimes you just get whapped for staring at yourself in the mirror too long.
Chapter 18
I spent the next two hours canvassing the neighborhood talking to neighbors. Evidently, the G-Agents, or Gents as I like to call them, had been telling the truth. Not one person saw an iota of suspicious activity by land or by sea. The last people I talked to were the parents of the curfew-breaking-pot-smoking teen and when I asked where their son was, they said he was doing research for a paper at the library.
If I remembered my misfit adolescent days correctly, “doing research at the library” translated roughly into drinking a Colt 45 on a rooftop or trying to get the neighbor’s daughter’s clothes off. Again on a rooftop. The key word here was rooftop, and I knew the exact rooftop I would find our teen in question.
I walked up the beach about two hundred yards until I came to an inlet that was home to the Surry Breakwater Lighthouse. Leading up to the lighthouse was a stretch of granite boulders jutting three-quarters of a mile into the bay. Each boulder was easily five by five by five—we’re talking feet here—and the walkway was stacked three high, five wide, and a par five long. There were about a thousand gulls lined up along the breakwater and each would fly a small circle when I passed, only to return to their perch.
The walk took about five minutes due to the large gaps between the rocks. Let’s just say the lighthouse was not exactly wheelchair accessible. As for the lighthouse, it was built in late 1879 and appeared not to have been renovated since early 1880. From the back, the lighthouse resembled a small two-story which sadly should have been condemned sometime around the Reagan administration. All the windows were boarded up, the paint had long been washed from the exterior, and there were more nails poking out than poking in.
I could hear strained voices stretching from the lighthouse annex’s quasi-shingled rooftop. I didn’t want to induce a mad scramble and, after much debate, I settled on, “I’m coming up there. If you run, you die.”
The voices fell silent. Using the guardrail, I catapulted myself onto the roof, ripping my pants on a nail that had long ago retired from active duty. Come to think of it, I don’t think I could design a more perilous location for a teenage hangout.
There were four of them sitting Indian-style on skateboards with blank expressions on their jewelry studded faces. The two girls had all their clothes on and I wondered if I needed to have a quick chat with the boys and explain the objectives.
I walked to their little group sitting on the dining table expanse of flat roof, taking the liberty of stealing a beer from the case hidden behind the farthest boy.
The four of them sat in stunned horror as the hipster doofus cracked the beer and brought it to his lips. I stopped short and said, “There are a couple rules of etiquette when it comes to beer.”
They all nodded, or it’s possible they each rolled their eyes so violently their heads appeared to nod, and I continued, “There is an unwritten rule that you never drink someone else’s beer unless they’re drinking with you.”
The group looked a shade puzzled and I asked, “This is your beer, right?” One of the girls nodded and I said, “That means all of you have to drink a beer so I can drink this beer. And I really want to drink this beer.”
The four of them looked at one another and slowly one-by-one took a Keystone Light from the box and cracked it open. They tried valiantly to act thirty-five, but it’s difficult when you can’t stop giggling and are on the verge of peeing your pants. After they’d each taken a couple sips, I asked, “How old are you guys?”
A girl with pink and green hair spoke up, “Thirteen. We’re seventh graders. Why, how old are you?”
“Eighteen. I’m a senior in high school.”
A boy with about seven earrings said, “Liar, you can’t be in high school, you’re like fifty.”
Ouch. If this had been my second beer rather than my first, I would have given the kid a wedgie. My neighbor looked like the only one not enjoying himself and I said, “Listen, I’m not going to say anything to your parents. I was doing the same thing when I was thirteen.” Give or take five years.
He nodded and took a sip of beer. I pushed fast-forward, “I need your guys’ help with something. Were you guys up here last night?”
My neighbor, the monkey off his back, said, “Yeah, we were up here.”
I made them all stand and pointed to the coastline near my house. “I know it was dark, but does anyone remember seeing a boat?” A boat in these parts was a rarity. I’d seen two boats in all of ten months.
Three of them shook their heads, but I saw my neighbor was nodding. I prodded him and he motioned for me to follow him. He walked to the edge of the lighthouse roof and said, “I came up here to take a whiz.” He showed me the flow urine would be likely to take with his hand and continued, “And I saw this boat floating way, way out there. I remember because it’s the only time I’ve ever seen one of them small boats around here.”
I asked him what it looked like. He thought it had two sails and was “medium sized.”
I had each of them program my number into their cell phone and directed them to call me if they saw the boat again or anything else suspicious for that matter. I finished off my beer and, after an inner strife, thought better of smoking a doobie with them.
Once safely back on the granite, I ran through what I’d learned over the course of the last half hour. One, kids started drinking beer and smoking pot at thirteen. Two, I could no longer pass for a senior in high school. And three, there was a boat drifting close to shore on the night of Jennifer’s murder.
All were equally interesting. All equally disturbing.
Chapter 19
I stopped at a liquor store on the way to Caitlin’s apartment. I was in the midst of opening her front door when I thought better and rang the doorbell. Caitlin opened the door and threw me a look which I decoded
as “Are you trying to piss me off?” Or something in that general vicinity.
I followed her into the living room and saw Conner and Lacy sprawled on the blue sofa. I hadn’t seen Conner’s Camaro and asked, “Where’s your car?”
Lacy said, “I made him walk. It’s a perfect fall evening.”
Apparently, young women never get killed on perfect fall evenings. Conner butted in before I could threaten his life, “Your sister is quite persuasive.”
Lacy had her hand clamped in a fist and said, “I held his dick hostage.”
As much as I love to hear about my sister’s sexual exploits, I retired into the kitchen. I put the case of Corona in the refrigerator and asked Caitlin if she needed any help with meal preparation. She threw me a look similar to the one at the front door and riding its coattails was the phone book. She said, “Here’s your meal preparation.”
I did a quick survey and it appeared Caitlin, Conner, and Lacy all wanted Chinese whereas Thomas Prescott wanted a pizza pie. Sometimes you have to take one for the team. I dialed a number and said loud enough for everyone to hear, “Is this China Dragon?”
“No, this is Domino’s.” Oops.
The doorbell rang twenty minutes later and I let Caitlin grab the door. She came back with two pizza boxes, my credit card receipt, and an expression of utmost annoyance. She said, “Chinese, huh? By the way, you just tipped the delivery boy seventy-four dollars.”
Interesting play. I hadn’t seen that coming.
If the three of them didn’t like the pizza, they faked their aversion well. After we fought for crusts, we quickly cleaned up. It was common knowledge when the four of us drew together we would play a laggard game of Trivial Pursuit. We split up into what used to be Couple vs. Couple but was now labeled, politically correctly, Adults vs. Children. Caitlin begrudgingly sat next to me on the couch, choosing to ignore my hand patiently awaiting a high five. What kind of team camaraderie is that?