Elysium Dreams

to pass out. Physically, he wasn’t an imposing man. Yet, his build belied his strength. He looked around for a robe and found one in the small bathroom. He hated when they were nude. It was such a pain in his ass to have to dress them. He found socks in a drawer and forced them on her feet, anger starting to seethe in him again. Why did women sleep nude in Alaska? It seemed so impractical to him. And it meant that he would have to dress them to get them to the spot without them freezing to death. It was taking away from his time to enjoy them.

  He roughly shoved her feet into slippers. She groaned. He had been prepared for this. Sometimes, they didn’t stay out as long as he needed. He took a hypodermic from his pocket. It was prefilled and injected her with it. The sedative would need a few minutes to take effect. He waited until her breathing was steady again and her eyelids had stopped fluttering to continue.

  Once her slippers were on, he searched around for a shirt. He found a dirty one in the hamper and with effort managed to get it on her. There were no sweats in the room. No lounge pants, no yoga pants, nothing to put on her lower half. He finally settled on a skirt he found in her closet and put it on her. Dressing the dead weight was tiring. He stopped after wrapping the robe around her and just sat on the bed getting his own breath back. He hit the button on his watch, it was nearly midnight. If he didn’t hurry, he wouldn’t be able to finish in time.

  Worse, he wasn’t sure how long the sedative would last on her. He hadn’t given her much. It should wear off in an hour, but that was another hour he was losing. He hated to rush. He might not do the job as cleanly as he wanted.

  After regaining his breath, he grabbed hold of Miss Ginny Jacobs and tossed her over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. The photos still smiled at him as he passed. He slammed his fist into one that showed Ginny and two young children at a park, smiling. Breaking free of its hook, it crashed to the floor. In the dark, it gave the illusion of being thunderously loud. He looked out the windows.

  It was a mistake to smash just the one photo. It would be noticed. Clumsily he tossed his prize onto the floor and began smashing the rest of the pictures in the house. To break one would be to show its importance. To break them all, would not reveal the secret.

  The street was still dark. It seemed no one had moved since he had arrived. But it was late, his biggest danger was teenagers up past their bed times and early morning workers on the way to their tedious jobs.

  Yet no one was out. No lights shown in house windows. He opened the front door, locked it behind him and slipped out onto the front porch with his prize. He tossed her into the backseat, ensuring that she was lying down.

  He drove out of her neighborhood. A hint of satisfaction crossing over his face, he pulled into the hotel he had passed earlier. There were still lights on inside some of the rooms. He recognized that one of them probably belonged to Marshal Cain and the other Dr. Reece. If only they knew how close he was to them. They could walk out the door at this very minute and catch him in the act. Or look out their window and report a suspicious vehicle. The engine was still running. He turned and put handcuffs on Miss Ginny Jacobs. He shoved a rag into her mouth. Then he stared at the lighted rooms.

  He’d done this before, sat outside FBI Special Agent in Charge Arons and waited for him to come out and notice the strange vehicle. He never had. But unlike the Marshals who appeared to be burning the midnight oil, Arons always seemed to be asleep.

  The clock ticked past 12:30 to 12:31. He put the SUV in gear and pulled out. He had work to get done. There was a nice park not far from the hotel. He took the opportunity to use it. One more dig at the US Marshals. If he frustrated them enough, they would leave the case to the hopeless FBI Special Agent in Charge Arons and go to work another case. He’d have to pass on the infuriating Marshal Cain, no matter how much she pressed his buttons.

  The park wasn’t very big. It did hold enough trees to keep him from being seen from the roads. Even his car would be hidden.

  Yes, this would get under their skin. His work found less than half a mile from their hotel. They would know that while they worked into the wee hours of the night, he had killed within walking distance of their hotel.

  He pulled his prey from the car. She was starting to come to. Her head lolled side to side and she made small noises through the cloth. This was working out to be a good night after all.

  Gently, he put down his tool bag. Inside was a blanket, he spread it out and placed her on it. Then he dug out a set of zip-ties and bound her feet. Next he took out a rubber mallet and a stake with an eye-hole. He pounded it into the frozen ground.

  He went back to his bag and found the hook. He attached it to the rope and climbed the tree. He wrapped the rope over it, twice, and let the weight of the hook carry it to the ground. Holding tightly to the other end, he climbed back down and ran the rope through the eye-hole. He tied it off and went back to the bag. Inside was a miniature winch. He set the winch next to the blanket, untied the rope from the eye-hole and ran it to the winch. The winch whined for a moment and began to swallow the rope. Satisfied, he looked around.

  It was time to create his masterpiece.

  Nine

  I wanted to yell at whoever was beating on my door. My eyes found the clock, it was just before eight in the morning. I’d gotten about three hours of sleep.

  The entire night I had gone through each file carefully, looking at them individually, to see if there was anything we had missed. I hadn’t come up with anything except sleep deprivation and a small headache.

  “Go away!” I finally shouted. I knew it was Gabriel. We were due into the Marshals’ office at eight. However, I was pretty sure my brain wasn’t going to function for another hour or so.

  “They found a body!” Gabriel shouted back.

  I got out of bed, stumbled to the door and opened it. Gabriel let himself into the room. He carried a can of soda.

  “You look like shit,” he held the can out to me. “Get dressed, we have to go.”

  “Good morning to you too,” I took the soda, put it on the table and grabbed my jeans off the floor and slipped them on over my pajamas. I found a bra and a shirt, turned around, giving Gabriel my back and put them on. My hair was still in a ponytail, but I took a few minutes to put any errant hairs back into place and tied it into a bun. I shed like a Saint Bernard in summer, so I always kept my hair up at crime scenes.

  I grabbed my fleece and a coat and slipped into both of them. I was dressed in less than five minutes. Gabriel grabbed the soda off the desk, popped the top and handed it to me. I downed it as we walked to the SUV and threw the empty into a trashcan that was in the back of the vehicle. I belched loudly.

  “How very ladylike. You look awful,” Xavier said.

  “I didn’t sleep much,” I growled at him.

  “Great, we’re dealing with Cranky Cain today,” Xavier gave me a grin and I couldn’t help but smile back.

  “We have Ginny Jacobs, age thirty-six, she teaches fifth grade at a local elementary,” Gabriel interrupted us.

  “How’d we get an identity so fast?” I asked.

  “Turns out, the locals have been holding back on us, he’s been leaving the victim’s identification cards at the scene,” Gabriel smiled at me. “Today they decided to share that little piece of information when I asked the same question.”

  “Seems like a little piece of information they should have shared a while ago,” Lucas said.

  “It’s worse when you get even more rural,” Gabriel shrugged, “and that applies everywhere, not just Alaska.”

  “I don’t think it has anything to do with the locals,” Lucas answered. “It’s us. A call to us means very bad things are happening.”

  “That could be,” Gabriel admitted as the car came to a stop. We had only driven a few blocks, but we were faced with a full wooded area. I stared at the snow, only a few footprints were visible and a dozen or so tire
tracks.

  “Is this one going to be trampled as well?” I asked.

  “No, it was found by a park ranger. So far, the press hasn’t gotten word because we’ve been using cell phones to communicate the find,” Gabriel answered. “There are a few dozen locals and of course, Agent Arons, other than that, the ranger that found the body. No lookie-loos and no reporters at this time.”

  “But you’re expecting them,” Xavier said.

  “Yep, I imagine this little party will only last for an hour at the most. Word is going to spread fast about another one,” Lucas said.

  “Pretty much,” Gabriel said, getting out of the car.

  We all followed behind. I trudged through the snow with my new boots. They weren’t exactly the right fit, just a hair too big. My feet slid around in them, making them almost treacherous on the snow. However, they were warm.

  The walk lasted about ten minutes. The trail of footsteps ended at a clearing. The body was still in place. She hung about ten feet off the ground. Again there was a small pool of blood frozen in the snow. I looked around, still no animal tracks. A few more steps and I got my first whiff of Pine-Sol. In the fresh air, it wasn’t strong enough to be overwhelming.

  Xavier had already moved to the body. He was trying to get the crime scene techs to lower the victim down. Lucas was surveying the scene. His eyes swept back