Copy Cat Read online

  “Anonymous calls seem to be popular these days.”

  “So do murders of ten-year-old girls. Is this another SAK copycat?”

  “Looks that way, though I haven’t been in yet. Gave Snowe a few minutes to get his shots.” She paused. “He posed her hands again. Saw that from the doorway.”

  Kitt nodded, and together, they headed for the victim’s bedroom. M.C. noticed that the other woman was limping. “What’s wrong?” she asked. “You’re moving like a lame horse.”

  Kitt sent her an irritated glance. “I went for a run last night. Had a message waiting for me when I got home. Thumbtacked to my front door.”

  “Peanut?” M.C. saw her wince at the name. “Yup. Said he saw me on TV and would be in touch. Bagged the note and brought it to ID this morning. Which, by the way, is why I’m late.”

  M.C. didn’t comment. They reached the child’s room, stepped inside. Several more ID guys had arrived; they all stood silently by the bed.

  Kitt and M.C. joined them. Snowe looked over at them, visibly shaken.

  “I didn’t expect this,” he said. M.C. didn’t have to ask what. The Sleeping Angel they had expected to find was, instead, a work of horror. The child’s once-beautiful face was screwed into a terrible scream.

  Kitt took a step backward, as if propelled by strong emotion. M.C. held her ground, though not without effort. They had all worked grislier crime scenes, seen bodies mutilated beyond recognition, victims who had been subjected to vile indignities, pre-and postmortem. But this child, the terror frozen on her face, was somehow more chilling, more horrible.

  “This one saw him coming,” Snowe muttered. M.C. cleared her throat. “If we’re lucky, she got a good whack at him. Scratched him, pulled out some hair.”

  Snowe squatted, examining the oddly bent fingers. “Nothing to the naked eye. Pathologist will scrape the nails. Here he is now.”

  She turned, grateful when she saw it was Frances Roselli on call. She wanted all the experience she could get.

  The older man reached the bed, made a sound.

  “It isn’t pretty, is it?”

  He slipped off his glasses, cleaned them, then slipped them back on. M.C. sensed he was composing himself.

  “You got your shots?” he asked Snowe.

  He had, and he and the rest of the identification team moved on. He looked at M.C. and Kitt. “Detectives?”

  “Anything jump out at you, other than her expression?” M.C. asked.

  “Not yet,” he said. “I want to get her hands bagged, then I’ll give her a look-over.”

  They thanked him and left him to his work.

  “Talked to the mother yet?” Kitt asked.

  “No. Let’s do it.”

  Mrs. Vest was still in the kitchen, only now a tall, middle-aged man was with her. The pastor, M.C. decided, judging by the cross hanging from a chain around his neck and the Bible on the table in front of him.

  “Mrs. Vest?” she asked. The woman looked up, her expression naked with pain. “We need to ask you a few questions. You think you’re up to that?”

  She nodded, looking anything but.

  “When did your daughter go to bed last night?”

  “Nine. That was her…that was her regular time.”

  “Did you tuck her in?”

  Her eyes welled with tears and her lips quivered. She shook her head. “I didn’t…I was working, so I-”

  She broke down sobbing. The pastor laid a comforting hand on her shoulder. M.C. noticed that Kitt looked away.

  “So you what, Mrs. Vest?”

  “I just…I just told her good-night.”

  “Where were you working?”

  “In bed.”

  “And when did you turn out the lights?”

  “Eleven.” M.C. had to strain to hear her small choked reply.

  “When you turned out the lights, did you peek in on her?”

  M.C. knew the answer by the woman’s tortured expression. Her heart went out to her. “Mrs. Vest, did you have company last night?”

  “Company?” She pressed the crumpled tissue to her eyes. “I don’t understand?”

  “A visitor.”

  She shook her head. “It was just us. Janie, that’s my oldest, spent the night with her best frien-” She looked up at the pastor. “How am I going to tell her about…she doesn’t…dear God.”

  M.C. waited, letting the woman cry, the pastor comfort her. When she appeared to have regained some composure, she asked again, “Did you have a visitor last night?”

  “I’m sorry, what?”

  “Do you have to do this now?” the pastor asked.

  “We do,” Kitt replied softly. “I’m so sorry.” She squatted in front of her. “Mrs. Vest, I know how hard this is. But we need your help catching the person who did this. Just a couple more questions. Please?”

  The woman nodded, clinging to the pastor’s hand. M.C. continued. “There were two wineglasses on your nightstand, Mrs. Vest. You’re certain you didn’t have company?”

  She stared blankly for a moment, as if she didn’t understand, then nodded. “They’re both mine. I didn’t…I’ve been so busy, I haven’t straightened up.”

  “Did you hear anything last night?”

  She shook her head, miserable.

  “Think carefully. A car passing? A dog barking?”

  “No.”

  “Did you awaken at all in the night?”

  Again, she indicated she hadn’t.

  Kitt stepped in. “Had your daughter expressed any concern about being followed? Or mention a feeling of being watched? Or having seen the same stranger more than once?”

  That had been the case with one of the original SAK victims, as well as the almost-victim whose house she had staked out. When the mother answered “No,” she tried again.

  “Anything odd occur over the past weeks? Notice any strange cars in the neighborhood? An unusual number of solicitors or other calls? Sales people coming to the door? Hangups?”

  Nothing. There was nothing.

  Later, as they left the scene, M.C. looked at Kitt, frustration pulling at her. “Who is this guy? Houdini?”

  “He’s got no special powers,” she replied, sounding weary. “Only the ones we give him.”

  M.C. stopped, faced her. “What the hell’s that supposed to mean?”

  “We’re all so comfortable with our hectic lives, we don’t notice anything. We’re sleepwalking, for God’s sake! He depends on that. Without it he couldn’t hurt these gir-”

  She sucked in a sharp breath. “Like that mother in there. Kicking herself. Wishing for a second chance. If my daughter was alive and this animal was still out there killing girls, I’d never take my eyes off her. Not tuck her in? She’d sleep with me! But it’s not an issue for me, is it? Not anymore.”

  Kitt’s voice shook. She visibly trembled. Inside the house she’d handled herself with absolute professionalism, not revealing to M.C. even a glimpse of the depth of her pain. How close to the emotional edge she was.

  Now M.C. saw; she didn’t know how to respond.

  Kitt didn’t give her the chance to come up with anything. She spun on her heel and walked away.

  17

  Friday, March 10, 2006

  3:00 p.m.

  Kitt sat at her desk. Her stomach rumbled and her head hurt. She felt as if she had been chasing ghosts all day. Ghosts, plural. Not just a killer who seemed able to manage the impossible, but her own personal ghosts, the ones that tormented her.

  She hadn’t had a face-to-face with Riggio since her emotional outburst. They had gone different ways-she to canvas the neighborhood, Riggio to interview the father, sister and others who’d had a relationship with the victim.

  Kitt dreaded their meeting. M.C. had probably spoken with both Sal and Sergeant Haas by now; she herself had provided all the ammo needed to undermine their confidence in her.

  Hell, she’d undermined her confidence in herself.

  Kitt brought a hand to
her head and massaged her aching temple. It was laughable, really. That first day, at the Entzel murder, she’d warned Riggio that “it wasn’t about her.”

  But Riggio had maintained her cool objectivity; it was she who had lost it. She who had made it “about her.” How had she actually believed herself strong enough for this?

  Her thoughts turned to the previous evening, the note she had found tacked to her door. She had bagged both the note and the tack, careful not to destroy any prints that might have been left on them. First thing, she had taken it to ID to have it dusted. Sergeant Campo, the ID supervisor, had arranged for one of the guys to go out and dust her door for prints. She didn’t think they’d find anything. “Peanut” was way too careful to make such a stupid mistake.

  I’ll be in touch.

  She shifted her gaze to her phone. But when would he call?

  She realized her hands were trembling and dropped them to her lap. There’d been a time that telltale tremble would have sent her scrambling for a drink. Liquid calm. She had kept a flask in her glove compartment and another tucked into a boot in her locker.

  No more. That was a part of her history she would never relive.

  “Hungry?”

  At the sound of her partner’s voice, Kitt looked up. M.C. stood in the doorway holding a brown paper sack. From the grease spots on it, she guessed the contents were from the deli across the street.

  “Starving,” she said cautiously, half expecting M.C. to say “Good” and pull out a big sandwich to eat in front of her.

  Instead, Riggio crossed to her desk, pulled up a chair and sat. “Figured you hadn’t stopped to eat, either.” She reached into the sack and pulled out two sandwiches. “Reuben or pastrami and swiss on rye?”

  Kitt frowned slightly, feeling off balance by the younger woman’s thoughtfulness. “You choose,” she said.

  Riggio passed her the pastrami and cheese. “I got chips, too. Mrs. Fisher’s, of course.”

  Mrs. Fisher’s was a Rockford brand; their hearty, kettle-style chips a local favorite. When Kitt was growing up, her mom bought them from the factory in three-gallon tins.

  They unwrapped the sandwiches-both topped with a big dill pickle spear-and began to eat.

  “Canvas turn up anything?” M.C. asked around a bite of the greasy Reuben.

  “Nada. Not even a dog barking.” Kitt washed the sandwich down with a sip of water. “This guy chooses a residential, out-of-the-way neighborhood. He leaves his car for hours on this quiet cul-de-sac, but nobody notices. Nobody hears a thing. Nobody needs to take a midnight leak, passes a window and sees the car. Who is this guy?”

  She thumbed through her notes, looking for something she might have overlooked. She shook her head. There was nothing. “Poor little thing turned ten just a month ago.”

  M.C. opened her bottle of water and took a drink. “Maybe he lives in the neighborhood.”

  “Makes sense. He didn’t drive in, he walked.” She ripped open the chips. “Thanks, by the way. What do I owe you?”

  “Nothing. You buy next time.”

  Mary Catherine Riggio was full of surprises.

  “Why are you being so nice?” she asked around a bite of sandwich.

  “I’m no Mother Teresa, Lundgren. Fact is, you’re no good to me if you’re not thinking clearly. You need to take care of yourself.”

  Or maybe not so full of surprises.

  “Let’s run a background check on every Tullocks Woods resident sixteen and up.”

  “Already begun.” Kitt popped a chip into her mouth and leaned back in her chair. “He doesn’t know all my secrets,” she murmured after a moment. “He’ll make mistakes. Move too fast. Screw up.”

  M.C. took another swallow of water. “What are you talking about?”

  “What the SAK said to me.” She met her partner’s eyes. “Both times he called, he described his crimes as ‘perfect.’”

  M.C. wiped her mouth with a paper napkin. “Right. That’s why he’s pissed. Somebody’s ripped him off. And he doesn’t think this somebody is doing it right.”

  “So, what makes the perfect crime?”

  “Easy. Getting away with it.”

  “And who gets away with it?”

  “The smart ones. The ones who are careful. The ones who plan.”

  “Exactly.” Kitt sat forward, feeling a stirring of excitement. “He told me, ‘This one will move fast, he won’t plan.’”

  Kitt saw that M.C. was getting excited, too. “When you move fast, you’re sloppy. You miss things. You’re seen. You leave things behind at the scene.”

  “The lack of evidence was one of the most frustrating things about the original SAK murders. He left us nothing to work with.”

  “He knew what he was doing. He was highly organized.”

  They fell silent. M.C. reached across and helped herself to one of Kitt’s chips. “So far, this one’s no different,” she said. “He’s left us nothing.”

  “That we’ve uncovered yet,” Kitt corrected. “And he certainly has moved fast. Two girls in three days.”

  M.C. munched on the chip, expression thoughtful. “What else made the original SAK murders unsolvable?”

  “The randomness of the choice of original victims was a huge roadblock. We never found a link between them. Yeah, they were all blond, blue-eyed ten-year-olds, but all from different sides of town, backgrounds, schools, you name it.”

  Usually a serial chose victims from a specific area, one he knew well and traveled often; or he chose them from a walk of life, such as prostitutes.

  It was unusual for them to operate outside their comfort zone.

  “So, how did he choose them?”

  “Exactly.” Kitt held out the bag of chips for her partner. “And don’t forget, he stopped at three. With each victim, the odds of capture are raised. Hell, Bundy admitted to twenty-eight murders and may have actually committed more. The SAK didn’t give us that.”

  “Why did he stop?” M.C. wondered aloud. “That’s another anomaly. Usually, they don’t.”

  “He was busted,” Kitt offered. “Ended up doing time on an unrelated crime. Took him out of circulation.”

  M.C. nodded. “It happens.”

  “Presuming my caller is telling the truth about a copycat, maybe these two met in prison?”

  M.C. agreed again. “That killing duo, Lawrence Bit-taker and Roy Norris, met in prison. Went on to jointly kill five teenage girls. Your caller is pretty proud of himself. I don’t see him hiding his ‘work.’ Probably bragged about how he pulled it off.”

  “But not to just anybody. It had to be somebody he trusted. Child killers are not beloved, even in the joint.”

  “And even if we assume these girls are his and not a copycat’s, prison still makes sense. It’s been five years since the last Sleeping Angel murder. We need the names of anyone recently released from the state pens.”

  Kitt sat back, mulling over the pieces, thinking aloud. “The original SAK committed three murders. He executed each crime exactly six weeks apart. Then he stopped.”

  She shifted her thoughts to his calls, the things he said. “He believes his crimes were perfect. That’s important to him, maybe even more important than getting away with the crime. What does that say about him? Who is this guy?”

  M.C. narrowed her eyes. “He’s arrogant. Cocky. Out to prove he’s the best.”

  “He thinks he has proved it,” Kitt offers. “Then along comes this ‘copycat.’ Our SAK is pissed. He doesn’t think this guy has the ability to pull ‘perfect’ off. He’ll make him look bad.”

  “He won’t be as careful,” M.C. says. “He’ll leave evidence behind. Or his victims won’t be random. Or he won’t have the self-control to stop. He’s already blown it by killing two girls in three days.”

  He’d seen this coming. Absolutely.

  He knew who the killer was.

  Kitt opened her mouth to say just that, then swallowed the thought as another jumped into her head.

&
nbsp; Self-control. Dear God.

  “What are you thinking?” M.C. asked.

  “If the SAK wasn’t in prison, if he was able to consciously stop in order to lessen the chances of being caught, he’s a whole different breed of serial. One with uncommon control over his urges.”

  “Which would make him that much more dangerous.”

  “Exactly.”

  M.C. stood. “Evidence is what it is.”

  “We have no way of knowing if and when he’ll stop.”

  “So we focus on finding a commonality between the victims.”

  “Bingo.” Kitt followed her to her feet, grabbing her jacket from the back of her chair. “Let’s fill Sal and Sergeant Haas in. Then talk to the girls’ parents.”

  18

  Friday, March 10, 2006

  4:20 p.m.

  Julie Entzel’s mother was still in her bathrobe and bed slippers when she answered the door. When she saw them, a look of fear came into her eyes, followed by one of hope.

  “Have you found out something?” she asked.

  “Nothing definite yet,” M.C. said gently. “We wanted to ask you a few more questions.”

  Margie Entzel looked crushed. She nodded and wordlessly opened the door wider. She shuffled deeper into the house, to a small family room. The television was on. The Weather Channel.

  She picked up the remote, hit Mute, then looked at them. “I like watchin’ it ’cause I don’t have to think.”

  Kitt murmured her understanding and leaned forward. “Mrs. Entzel, I’m Detective Lundgren. I’m so sorry for your loss.”

  The woman’s throat worked; she struggled to speak. “I seen you on TV the other night. Today, I seen where another girl got killed.”

  “Yes.” Kitt glanced at her partner, then back at Margie Entzel. “We are going to catch him. Soon. You can help us.”

  The mother clasped her hands on her lap, expression growing determined. “How?”

  “We’re trying to find a link between your daughter and the other girl who was killed. Did you know her or the family?”

  She shook her head that she didn’t. They ran through the list of possible places their paths intersected: school, church, pediatrician, the places they shopped, restaurants they frequented. M.C. took notes while Kitt listened and prodded the mother’s memory.