First Time Killer (29 page)

“What took you so long?”

“Where are you?” Rick’s head whipped around. Darkness everywhere.

“Nearby.”

“Nearby where?”

“I’ll give you directions as you walk. So, start walking. Continue down the path in the direction you were going. I’m timing you. If you take too long, the deal’s off.”

Rick hesitated for a second, then scooped up his flashlight and hustled to the path. The cops would figure out a way to follow him, wouldn’t they? He couldn’t risk giving anything away by stopping or acting weird. For all he knew, First Time was in the woods, tracking his progress along the way. Rick began walking at a brisk pace. He didn’t want to jog in case the meeting place was miles away. Didn’t want to collapse before he accomplished his goal. “How far?”

“Just keep walking. Nice night for a stroll, isn’t it?”

Rick grunted, kept on going. Up a slight incline, then the trail dipped away, affording Rick a view of the path snaking through the park below, the circles of light from the streetlights like lily pads on a pond. He maintained his pace, walkie-talkie pressed to one ear inside the hood of his parka. The downward gradient of the path aided his momentum.

“Rick? Still with me?”

Rick depressed the transmit button. “Yeah. Still here. Am I getting close?” His heart raced.

“Closer every minute, I reckon. Where are you now?”

Rick stopped, tried to settle his breathing. Too much cake and not enough exercise during the past few years. He looked around. On his left was a small play area. In the dark, he could make out a corkscrew slide and a see-saw. “I crested the hill about a hundred yards ago. Now I’m by a playground.” He fought the urge to look behind him for the cops. Had they fallen asleep or gotten frostbite?

“Okay. Keep going. When the path forks, bear to the left.”

Two minutes later, the path split. Off to the right were some baseball fields where the WTLK softball team had participated in a couple of charity events the previous year. He’d never been down the path to the left.

“I just took the fork. I’m headed your way.” At least he hoped he was. Rick didn’t know what the range of these walkie-talkies was, but he guessed it could be miles and miles. He was getting too old for this kind of nonsense, playing capture-the-flag in the middle of the night. Except this was capture-the-killer.

Fifty yards further, the path opened up into a giant, bowl-shaped clearing, ringed by thick woods. Half a dozen lights mounted on twelve-foot poles provided some illumination, enough for Rick to tell he’d come upon a picnic area. Six or eight picnic tables were spread out in haphazard fashion and a few box-like metal grills dotted the grounds. Nearby, a trashcan overflowed with garbage.

Across the clearing, seated at the farthest picnic table, was First Time. Waving at him.

Rick spoke first, into the walkie-talkie. “I see you. Seated.”

“And I see you too, Rick Jennings.” First Time continued to wave.

Rick was too far away, and it was too dark, for him to see any facial features. First Time appeared to be a normal-sized guy. Wore a long, dark coat. Still waving. Rick returned the wave but didn’t move. It was time for Adams to make his entrance.

R
ICK TENSED, WAITING
for Adams and his men to come charging over the hills and capture First Time in a blaze of glory. He stood frozen, waiting.

Nothing happened. No SWAT team, no helicopter assault. No sniper taking First Time down with a well-placed shot to the frontal lobe.

“Please, come closer. Awful hard to conduct an interview from forty yards away.” First Time chuckled, kept on waving.

Rick tried to act casually, rotating his head in a circle as he searched the shadows for the cavalry. The only movement, First Time’s waving hand.

“Is there a problem, Rick? It’s cold out here and I’d like to get started.”

“Okay. Sure.” Rick stepped toward the picnic table.

Suddenly, First Time leaped up. Whirled to his right, whirled to his left. Then he shot off like a rocket across the clearing, away from Rick. It took Rick a couple of seconds to notice three or four cops charging at the picnic table from different directions. All yelling at First Time to stop. First Time had almost reached the woods when he reversed direction and came tearing back toward Rick. Rick hit the dirt, afraid First Time might have a gun. He watched as one of the cops raced after First Time and tackled him from behind. The two bodies skidded a bit before coming to a stop.

The other cops were there in a flash, and First Time didn’t struggle as he was subdued. The tackling cop knelt on First Time’s back with his knee as he snapped the cuffs shut. Three other cops surrounded First Time, guns drawn and trained on the murderer.

Rick got to his feet and dusted himself off. He noticed Adams jogging toward First Time from the perimeter of the clearing, long legs closing the distance quickly.

The cops peppered First Time with commands, mostly telling him to remain where he was. From Rick’s vantage, it didn’t look like he was trying to go anywhere. He was just yelling shit at the cops. Pleading about something. The lights cast eerie shadows that seemed to shout, too. First Time wasn’t so scary, lying flat on the ground surrounded by cops with their guns drawn. More like pitiful. Rick exhaled and took a few steps closer to the action.

A voice sounded from the walkie-talkie in Rick’s hand. “You fucker! I knew you couldn’t be trusted.” First Time’s robotic voice cracked slightly with emotion.

Rick’s jaw opened to reply, but no sound came out. What was going on? Who was the man lying on his face, handcuffed, getting roughed up by the cops? And where the hell was First Time? He tried again to speak. This time, his words sounded like someone else was uttering them. “Where are you? Who do they have?”

“BETRAYERS,” First Time bellowed. “You will all pay for this. Let death and destruction be on your heads.” He paused, and continued, less violently, almost compassionately. “Goodbye, Ringmaster Rick Jennings.” Then First Time clicked off.

Rick sprinted toward Adams and the group holding their suspect. When he got within ten feet, Adams held up his hand. The universal stop sign. “We know, we know. We’ve been duped.” Adams wiped his face with his hand, letting it linger an extra few seconds, then removed it. “Shit.”

Rick couldn’t sleep. Too much adrenaline in his system, too much regret on his mind. If he could have figured out First Time’s scheme a little sooner, maybe Adams’s men would have been able to nab him. It wasn’t quite seven, and Barb was still sleeping. She hadn’t awakened when Rick climbed into bed about an hour and a half ago. She was going to be royally pissed he was shipping her and Livvy back to Ray’s. And he didn’t blame her one bit.

He climbed out of bed and stumbled into the bathroom. Took a long, hot shower, trying to scrub away the events of the night. When his skin was raw, he gave up.

Barb was plenty pissed, but the anger gave way to fear, and the conversation quickly deteriorated into sobbing. The tears segued into a lot of hugging and many promises. Rick hoped the promises wouldn’t turn out to be empty ones.

In the end, though, Barb didn’t even argue about returning to Ray’s.

Thirty minutes after dropping them at Ray’s, Rick arrived at work, bleary-eyed and defeated. He managed to avoid meaningful conversation with anyone as he made his way to his office. He plopped down into his chair and unwrapped the energy bar he’d gotten for breakfast at 7-Eleven. Before he could take a bite, the phone rang. It was Adams.

“Yes, Detective?” The last thing he wanted to do was rehash last night’s fiasco.

“I’d like to talk with you for a few minutes.” Polite, but determined.

Might as well get it over with. “Sure. I can spare a few minutes.”

“About last night,” Adams said, then paused. Rick wondered if he’d gotten any sleep.

“What about it?”

“First, thanks for calling me and tipping me off yesterday. It was the smart thing to do, even though we didn’t catch him. No telling what he might have done to you. And we don’t need any more bodies. Don’t need the public afraid to leave their homes.”

Rick didn’t respond, the weight of the past twenty-four hours heavy on his shoulders.

“Anyway, the guy we took down last night wasn’t much help. Said a man approached him about midnight. Rousted him from his sleep. Didn’t get a look at his face, but said he was a big guy.” Adams clucked. “A big guy. Of course, anyone looks big all bundled up in a parka.”

“So?”

“So, we had a guy watching Dimitri Papadoukas’s apartment last night. Stayed in all night. Just to make sure, right after it went down, our guy knocked on Dimitri’s door. The little guy answered it. And he was kinda grumpy, too.”

“You thought Dimitri was First Time? He’s only about five feet tall. He couldn’t kill a rodent.”

“Well, we had our doubts about Lazzeri after we questioned him. And after you told us First Time called you again, we pretty much ruled him out. Kicked him loose, in fact. Too unbalanced to plot things out.” Adams paused. “So we thought it would be prudent to watch another ‘person of interest’ last night. Dimitri.”

“You guys are unbelievable. Truly. Next you’ll be watching my eighty-year-old mother in Boston.”

Adams responded quickly. “Your mother obsessed with your show, too? She run a crazed-fan website? Does she eat, drink, and breathe
Afternoon Circus
?” An edge had crept into his voice. “You should be grateful we’re being thorough.”

Rick took a deep breath. “Sorry. Didn’t sleep, as you might imagine. Anything else, Detective?”

“Actually, yes. We’ve done some additional tests with voice disguising hardware, similar to the kind we think First Time is using.”

“And?”

“And it’s a tough nut to crack. You can alter the pitch so a man sounds like a woman, and vice versa. We had a difficult time telling one speaker from another.”

Things were getting worse and worse. “In other words, Detective, it really
could
be my mother calling in.” Rick closed his eyes and inhaled. Exhaled slowly. “Do me a favor. Catch this asshole. Quickly, before he kills someone else.”

Around ten o’clock, Rick needed two things. To stretch his legs and refill his coffee mug. Tough operating on zero sleep. He hit the break room for his coffee, then wandered out into the lobby. Things seemed off somehow. He wasn’t used to being at the station so early.

He got an odd look from the young lady at the front desk—another new receptionist, they’d been going through them at an alarming rate—but he ignored it. He thought about taking a little walk on the streets of Fairfax to clear his head, but decided to let the coffee do the job instead. Besides, he needed to fill Winn in about what had transpired. He nodded to the receptionist as he made his way back up to Winn’s office. She didn’t return the greeting.

Rick hadn’t heard anything about last night’s adventure on the radio, and he figured Adams had put a clamp on any leaks. Didn’t want to give the department a bad name if he could help it. Strangely, Adams hadn’t said anything to him about not running with the news. Maybe he figured it would give Rick a bad name too, being involved in a debacle. Whatever, he’d talk it over with Winn.

Winn’s office door was closed, so Rick gave it a quick rap and pushed it open without waiting for a reply. Winn hunched over his desk, searching for something in his file drawer. His head jerked up, and he slammed the drawer shut. The clang reverberated in the small office.

“Didn’t your mama tell you it was polite to knock first, before barging in?” Winn asked, without his usual smirk.

“I did knock,” Rick said, as he lowered himself into the metal chair in front of the desk. “You just didn’t answer quick enough.” He smiled, trying to goad Winn into smiling himself. No luck. “Something wrong?”

Winn reached for a small plastic container on his desk and flipped the top up. Shook a few Tic-Tacs into his mouth. “No. I’m fine.” Still no smile.

“You don’t seem fine.”

“Can’t you just leave an old fart alone?”

Rick smelled mint on Winn’s breath, along with something else. Something fermented. “Shit, Winn. Have you been drinking? So early?”

“It’s after five somewhere in the world. Why should they have all the fun?” He glanced at Rick uncertainly. “Just a little nip. Hair of the dog, and all that.”

Rick didn’t let him off the hook. “I’m concerned about you. And so is Barb. She—”

“Come on, don’t drag her into this. She didn’t lose her spouse. At least not yet.” Winn didn’t meet Rick’s gaze, instead casting his eyes down at his desk blotter. Then he swiveled to his computer and started tapping keys. “Look, I’m busy.”

Rick let the drinking drop—for now. He’d return to it when Winn was in a more receptive frame of mind. It would be noise on deaf ears unless Winn was ready to listen. “Want an exclusive? From an eyewitness? An eyewitness involved with First Time?”

Winn broke away from the computer, fixed Rick with his stare. “This more bullshit?”

“No. Serious. You wouldn’t believe what happened last night,” Rick said, then recapped the incident. When he was through, he sat back and waited for the newshound to pepper him with questions.

“Why didn’t the cops search the area behind the rest rooms as soon as you told them where the meet was going to be?” Winn had drawn a notepad from his desk and was jotting down notes.

“They had a guy watching it, from the trees, but they didn’t want to be seen scouring the area, just in case First Time was watching, too. Didn’t want to give themselves away.” Rick cleared his throat. “Evidently, First Time buried the walkie-talkie before he called me.”

“Who was the guy they nabbed?”

“Some homeless dude. First Time paid him twenty bucks to sit at the bench and hold a walkie-talkie up to his ear. When he saw me, he was supposed to wave. Friendly-like.” Rick waved to Winn, like the guy had waved to him.

“Did the homeless guy give the cops a description?” Winn’s eyebrows arched.

“Nothing worth anything. Said First Time was a big guy bundled up in a parka with a ski mask on. Plus the homeless guy was a few sheets to the wind. Antifreeze for a cold night.” Rick shot a glance at Winn’s lower drawer. “Even as the cops held him down on the ground and searched him, he was screaming for his money. First Time told him the man who he waved to would give him another twenty bucks.”