Killer Insight

  Padding back to the bed, I plopped backward and just stared up at the ceiling for a while. Just as I could feel a really good cry coming on, I heard Viv’s phone ring and then her soft footfalls in the hall. She knocked on my door and I said, “Come on in, Viv.”

  “It’s Duffy; he’s on the phone for you.”

  “Thanks,” I said, sitting up and extending my hand as she handed me the phone.

  “Let him down easy, Abby,” she suggested as I lifted the phone to my ear.

  “Thanks, Viv, I’ll do my best,” I said with my hand over the mouthpiece.

  “First Rachel, now you,” Viv muttered as she turned to walk out of the room. “That poor boy has no luck with women.”

  I waited for Viv to close the door before removing my hand from the mouthpiece and saying, “Hi, Duff. Calling to wish me a bon voyage?”

  “Can I talk you into staying?”

  “No.” I smiled. “But you may be able to talk me into coming back.”

  “Kelly says that you’re thinking of moving here.”

  “The thought had crossed my mind,” I said.

  “So how do I make the idea stick?”

  I laughed. “By being nice to me, and calling me every once in a while when I get back to Michigan.”

  “Doable,” he said. “What time’s your flight?”

  “Ten A.M.”

  “Did you need a lift to the airport?”

  “I’ve got a cab lined up,” I said. Truthfully, my thought had been that if I asked Duffy to take me I’d chicken out of flying home and send Dave a wire to ship my things and Eggy here.

  “Okay. Listen,” he said, and his voice grew serious. “They found Kelly’s car.”

  “They did?”

  “Yeah. They found it about a quarter mile from the colonel’s place.”

  “Any sign of Biggins?”

  “None. But his prints are all over the inside of the car. You know, I’m liking my mom’s theory that Biggins might have killed Gina, and that he’s a likely suspect in Sara’s disappearance.”

  “Did you check into his record?”

  “Yep. And it’s ugly. Among other things, the guy’s a serial rapist. He’s been locked up three times for that beginning in the mid-eighties. His last incarceration was an eight-year stint in the Kansas State pen for raping twin sisters. One of them he beat badly enough to cause permanent brain damage.”

  I winced and asked, “How long ago did he get out?”

  “He was released six weeks ago, on parole.”

  My intuition buzzed, and something about Biggins as the killer didn’t seem to fit. “So, now he’s changed his method, and he’s killing his victims?”

  “One of those really nasty statistics about repeat offenders says that serial rapists who’ve been caught and incarcerated before learn not to leave witnesses behind the next time they rape, and they quickly go from serial rapists to serial killers.”

  “Ah,” I said with a shiver as I absorbed that factoid. Thinking about what Duffy said, I asked, “If we play this through, then how does Eddie tie in? I mean, how was it that Gina’s ticket was purchased with Eddie’s credit card, which was found in his wallet at the scene of the crime? And what about the bloody scrubs in Gina’s car, and the hair? Biggins has brown hair.”

  There was an audible sigh on Duffy’s end of the line. “If I had to shoot a theory I’d say that Gina used Eddie’s card number to book her flight. I checked her credit history and she was maxed out to the limit. In fact, she had three cards already in collection. Also, her bank account wasn’t more than a couple of hundred bucks, and Gina had a reputation for borrowing money from friends and not paying it back.”

  “Really?” I said, a little surprised by that. “I thought she made a good living at Fidelity. Where’d all her money go?”

  “You saw her closet. The girl loved to shop. And she had expensive taste.”

  “So, she steals Eddie’s credit card number; then what?”

  “We already know Biggins is a pickpocket. He could have gone to the hospital, dug around in Eddie’s locker, stolen his scrubs and the wallet and attacked Gina later.”

  “That would be a remarkable coincidence,” I said as I tried to make the jigsaw puzzle pieces fit. “The fact that Gina and Eddie know each other as friends, and a total stranger steals his wallet and targets her as his next victim?”

  “Maybe Biggins was stalking Gina, and saw her with Eddie. Maybe that’s what led him to steal Eddie’s wallet and scrubs. Maybe Eddie was framed.”

  My right side felt light and airy. “You know, Duffy, I think you’re on to something there.”

  “And if Biggins was stalking Gina, he’d have ample opportunity to scope out Sara as well.”

  “Ellie’s gang does hang out together a lot,” I mused. “So, you really think Biggins is the guy?”

  “If I put those pieces together like that, then yes.”

  Something still nagged at me, and after a moment of silence I reached out to my guides for some advice. With a powerful jolt I had an insight and said, “If Biggins had time to scope out Sara, he also had time to scope out the other bridesmaids.”

  “Which is why you’ll notice a patrol car cruising periodically up and down Viv’s street. I’ve also got one posted at my parents’ house and another paying close attention to Christina’s.”

  “Have you told her about Biggins?” I asked.

  “Right before I called you I gave her a jingle and left her a voice mail. I’m waiting for her to call me back.”

  I wanted to relax after he told me about the patrol cars, but my crew was still flashing a warning. “Thanks for looking out for me,” I said to him.

  “Part of my new duty as knight in shining armor,” Duffy replied.

  “Night, Duffy,” I sang with a smile.

  “Bon voyage, girl.”

  I lay awake for several hours in the dark that night, unable to stop the restless thoughts zipping around in my brain. Beyond my making the big decision to move to Colorado, there was something else that was nagging at the edges of my mind. The only way I can describe it is to say that it felt like I was on the verge of some huge decision that was even greater than the idea of moving twelve hundred miles to the west.

  It felt as if I were standing at a crossroads of immense importance. Go right and my destiny would shape one way. Go left and it would form a completely different future. As I examined the root of this, I came up with several theories, most having to do with whether to move or not to move. But none of those quite fit. I puzzled about it long into the night, never really coming to a sense of peace with it.

  The next morning I was up very early and feeling a bit sluggish from lack of sleep. I took a long, hot shower, careful not to make too much noise, as I didn’t want to wake Viv. My efforts were fruitless, however, because by the time I came out of the shower she was already hustling about the kitchen. “Morning, Viv,” I said as I walked out of the bathroom.

  “Abigail,” she said. “Duffy called while you were in the shower. He and Ellie are on their way over. I guess something else awful has happened.”

  “What?” I said, halting in my tracks. “Did they say what it was?”

  “No, but I could hear Ellie crying in the background.”

  “Oh, my God, maybe they’ve found Sara,” I said, and ran into the bedroom to throw my things into the suitcase and finish getting dressed before they arrived. I pulled my jeans and sweater from the chair I’d draped them over and got them on, then dashed to grab my cell phone from the charger and push any other belongings into my suitcase. Just as I zipped it closed I heard people in the front hall. Shoving my boots on, I headed out to greet Duffy, Kelly, Ellie, Nina and Jimmy. “What’s happened?” I asked as they all filed in. Ellie looked so gaunt and distraught. It had to be news about Sara.

  “It’s Christina,” Duffy said. “We think she’s been taken by Biggins.”

  “What?”

  “I hadn’t heard from her,” Ellie cho
ked out with a sob. “So Kelly and I went over to her place, and she wouldn’t answer, but I just knew something was wrong. One of Christina’s windows was open a little, so I hoisted Kelly through it, and it looked like the place had been torn to pieces!”

  I looked back to Duffy. Ellie wasn’t making sense. “I don’t understand,” I said.

  “Ellie called me from Christina’s a few hours after I got off the phone with you. I headed over, and her apartment looks like a tornado’s been through it. There are definitely signs of a struggle, and a brutal one. We found evidence of blood on one of the curtains. We think it’s Christina’s.”

  “Oh, my God,” I said, and felt my knees grow weak. “This cannot be happening,” I said to Duffy, my eyes pleading with him to tell me something different.

  “We need you, Abby,” he said to me. “We need you to try to draw one of your sketches again. Maybe Christina is somewhere we can recognize.”

  I looked at him blankly for a beat or two before saying, “You also want me to look at her photo, don’t you?”

  “We need to know,” Nina said gently as she pulled out a photo of several girls, three of whom stared back at me in a plastic, flat way.

  I looked at the photo for only a second, then back up into Nina’s eyes. She obviously read my expression, because she gave me a pinched look and pulled her hand across her mouth as tears formed, then streamed down her face.

  Ellie gave a tight sob and turned to her father, who then wrapped her in his arms and stroked her hair.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said as I reached out to her. But she was inconsolable.

  “Will you draw your sketch?” Duffy said, his expression tight and hard as he handed me his pen and notebook.

  “Yes,” I said, and walked over to the table. I sat down and stared at the paper. This was awful. I closed my eyes, wishing I could start this whole trip over again. Wanting to go back in time to when these girls were still alive and tell them about the danger they were in. Instead I had to focus on where their bodies lay.

  Ellie continued to cry in the background as I dug deep, willing myself to focus and concentrate. These people needed my help, and maybe, if we were lucky and found Christina, then there might be a clue that would help us nail this son of a bitch too. I concentrated on the question I had to ask my guides, and finally I said, Show me the area where Christina’s body is hidden. Give me landmarks to go by.

  Immediately I had an image in my head and opened my eyes and began to draw on the paper. I made a small square in the center and then some long lines above the square. To the right I drew what looked like a very tall mushroom, and to the left I drew a cross. Moving back to the center of my sketch I drew another square within the first square, and on top of that I placed a star.

  I stopped then and turned the paper toward Duffy, who examined it carefully, then said, “Holy shit!”

  “What?” Jimmy said. “What is it, son?”

  “I know where this is!” Duffy said, and moved the sketch over toward his father. “See this? That’s the colonel’s field. And this is the water tower on the edge of his property. Abby, this makes sense. Biggins hid Gina’s body in the colonel’s shack. Then he left Kelly’s car a quarter mile away from here. This must be where he takes the women he kidnaps!”

  “Sara’s close by there too,” I said dully. I was still reeling from the shock of Christina’s death.

  Ellie gasped. “We have to find them,” she said. “We have to find them and bring them home.”

  Duffy pulled the mouthpiece of his walkie-talkie off his shoulder and began rifling orders into it. When he was finished he looked at all of us and said, “You all stay here. I’ve got a search party gathering, and we’ll call you with any news.”

  “No way,” I said as I walked over to grab my coat. “I’m going with you.”

  Duffy cocked his head at me. “You can’t. You have a plane to catch.”

  “There will be other planes,” I said, quoting my sister. “Besides, you’ll need me out there in the field.”

  “Forget about it, Cooper,” Duffy said, puffing out his chest at me. “By all accounts Biggins is likely armed, dangerous and lurking in those woods. I’m not risking having another one of you kidnapped.”

  “He’s not there,” I said defiantly, my voice steady and calm, my resolve firm.

  “How do you know?”

  “My spidey sense is telling me he’s not hanging out on the colonel’s property, just hoping to nab another woman. Besides, you need me to act as bloodhound. You’ll find them a whole lot faster if I’m around.”

  Everyone looked at Duffy while he weighed what I’d said. Finally, he said, “Okay, but you are to sit in the car, and this time you are to stay put, hear me?”

  I saluted, and just as I shrugged into my coat Ellie said, “I’m going too.”

  Duffy cut her a glance. “No friggin’ way,” he said.

  “She was my friend, Duffy!” Ellie screamed, the sound of her voice making us all wince.

  “El,” he said calmly, looking into her slightly wild eyes. “You’ve been through too much. Why don’t you just go home and rest?”

  “I have to be there for them!” Ellie shouted, the volume only slightly lower this time.

  “I could go for you,” Kelly said meekly. “I could be there for them, Ellie.”

  Ellie looked at Kelly, and her emotions broke again as tears streamed down her cheeks.

  “You know,” Duffy said, looking at Kelly appraisingly, “that’s not such a bad idea. I mean, if you’re up to it. Biggins probably took you there the night he kidnapped you. Maybe if you come with us you’ll remember something?”

  Kelly nodded, her large brown eyes fixed on him. “I could try,” she said.

  “Then it’s settled. Mom, Dad, take Ellie home and keep an eye on her. Abby, Kelly, you’re with me.”

  “What about me?” Viv shouted as we all began to troop toward the front door.

  “Come on, Aunt Viv, you can come home with us,” Nina said with uncharacteristic gentleness for the old woman. I had to hide a smirk at the look of surprise on Viv’s face as she eyed Nina.

  “Well, as long as I’m not a bother,” Viv said.

  “Exactly, and I’ll hold you to that,” Nina replied.

  On the way over to the colonel’s, Duffy called in the troops, then gave us the ground rules. “So the drill is that when we get to the field, you two will stay put in the car until we’ve made a preliminary search of the area.” We were riding in Duffy’s Mustang, and I strained to hear from the backseat as the police radio he had up front crackled with static. “We’re going to do a grid search of the area to try and flush out Biggins. If we flush him, or find Christina, then we won’t need your radar, Abs. If we don’t find him or Christina, then I’ll come back and get you, and we can see if you can pick up anything in the field. We cool?”

  “What about me?” Kelly asked from the front seat.

  Duffy smiled at her like a big brother. “You are to remain safe and sound in the warmth and comfort of my sweet little chariot, young lady,” Duffy said with a wink. Kelly giggled, and I had to work at keeping my eye roll to a minimum. “Besides, it’s colder than a penguin’s butt out. Trust me, by keeping you in the car I’m doing you a favor.”

  When Duffy had finished, he got back on the radio and checked the status of the other deputies. I sat in the backseat and shuffled through my purse, looking for something to write on. I found the sketch I’d drawn for Cat when she had asked about where I thought Sara was, I looked at it for a moment, turned it over and began to duplicate what I’d just drawn in Viv’s kitchen. I stared at my newest drawing for a long time.

  I had an odd feeling about the area. A mixture of trepidation and anxiety was crawling along my senses, and the closer we got to the colonel’s field, the more my stomach seemed to develop butterflies. I didn’t like it, and I didn’t quite know why.

  A short time later Duffy parked in almost the same spot he had the night
we found Gina. There were three other patrol cars already there, and in short order four more unidentified patrol cars joined us. I noticed that the men who got out of these wore blue windbreakers with FBI stamped in bright yellow across the back.

  “You called in the Feds?” I asked Duffy.

  “Biggins is wanted across state lines, and if he’s turned from serial rapist to serial killer, like I think he has, we need as much support on this as we can get,” he answered as he took a clipboard from the dash and some ammo from the side compartment next to the gearshift. He then turned sideways in his seat and gave both of us a stern look as he said, “Remember, stay in the car until I come back to get you. We’ll be on our walkie-talkies when we do the grid, so if you want to know what’s going on all you have to do is listen to the chatter,” he said, indicating the radio. “I’m leaving the keys in the car so you can keep the heat on, okay?”

  “Roger wilco,” I said, and saluted smartly.

  “Dodger that,” Kelly said, following my lead.

  Duffy’s eyelids drooped in a look that said we were testing his patience, but he added a smirk as he got out of the car.

  Kelly and I watched Duffy as he gathered the other deputies and FBI agents around him and showed them my crude map. We saw him point toward the right end of the field, and in the distance we could just make out the top of the water tower Duffy had referred to. The men walked as a group down the small embankment. Once they cleared the shack, they fanned out and began to walk in one line, sweeping their eyes right and left as they searched the field. After a while they entered the woods, and the group disappeared from sight.

  Kelly turned in her seat when the last deputy vanished and said, “It’s pretty creepy now that they’re out of sight, huh?”

  “Very,” I said, as a ripple of unease flowed along my spine. “I don’t really like it here,” I added.

  “Me neither. Thank God you’re along. If he makes me wait in this car when he gets back and takes you, I don’t know what I’ll do.”

  “At least it’s daylight,” I said with a small shiver.

  “You cold?” she asked me, and reached for the heat to turn it up. As she did so I noticed a reflection from the sun on her wrist.