Freak (16 page)

“Yeah?” he said. Tall, close to six feet and skinny, he had longish messy brown hair and a jawline full of pimples. He was
dressed in stained sweatpants and a faded Puget Sound State Steelheads T-shirt that sagged around his ribs. His skin was pasty and his dark eyes had grayish circles, as if he hadn’t been out of the house for a while.

“We’re looking for Jeremiah Blake.” Torrance eased closer to the door frame so that his foot was inside the house by about an inch.

“That’s me,” the kid said.

Torrance and Jerry exchanged a look. Surely this couldn’t be the same Jeremiah Blake who was writing to Abby Maddox. The DMV records showed he was forty-five. This kid couldn’t be out of high school. Torrance flashed his badge and Jerry did the same with his consultant’s ID. “You’re Jeremiah Blake? Are your parents home?”

The kid took a step back, his eyes widening at the sight of Torrance’s badge. “My dad’s not here. His name’s Jeremiah, too. What do you—”

“Can we come in?” The detective’s face was like stone. “Or would you rather talk outside where all your neighbors can see us?”

The kid poked his head out onto the stoop and looked around. Indeed, one of the neighbors next door, a middle-aged man who had just pulled into his driveway, was observing the three of them curiously. “All right, come in,” he said reluctantly, opening the door wider and taking another step back.

Torrance and Jerry stepped into the house. The three of them stood in the front foyer in a triangle, eyeballing each other. The hip-hop changed to heavy metal, an assault on Jerry’s ears.

“How about you turn that off for a little bit?” Torrance said, his eyes crinkling at the noise. “So we can talk.”

The teenager shrugged and turned for the hallway. The
two men exchanged a look and then followed him. The house wasn’t big and they were in the kid’s bedroom a few footsteps later.

Blake’s room was small, cluttered, and generally a disaster. The floor was a mess of dirty clothes, old fast-food cups, and crumpled cheeseburger wrappers. A large tube television sat in one corner, the screen frozen on a scene of an eerily real cartoon man shooting a bunch of other men, blood spraying out of their chests where they’d been hit. The video game box sitting on top of the TV said “Gears of War 3.” Wow. So much blood for one video game. The last game Jerry could remember playing was Galaga, over three decades ago.

Wrinkling his nose, he sidestepped a pizza box that was open but empty aside from a few bits of hardened cheese left behind. Empty Twizzlers wrappers—the family pack size—were everywhere. The tiny bedroom held a rank blend of body odor, old gym shoes, and stale food—a special scent also known as teenage boy. Jerry’s sister’s son had a room just like this one, but with one noticeable difference.

In this room, every inch of wall space was covered with posters. Some were of rock bands Jerry had never heard of—the Killers, Foo Fighters, Act of Mercy. And intermingled with those were posters of serial killers. The faces of Ted Bundy, Charles Manson, Ed Gein, and even Ethan Wolfe lined his walls. And those were just the ones Jerry recognized.

Blake didn’t have any posters of Abby Maddox, probably because there weren’t any available, because technically she wasn’t yet a convicted serial killer. But there were several printouts of Maddox’s face taped strategically around the room. They were in black-and-white but the kid had colored in Maddox’s eyes with pencil crayon in the exact right shade of blue-violet.

Jerry suppressed a shudder.

Blake flipped the stereo off then turned around. At the sight of them, he jumped, not realizing they were right behind him. Jerry followed Torrance’s gaze to the kid’s laptop, which was sitting open on the bed and powered on. The browser was showing a website called
The Serial Killer Files
. Blake saw them looking and quickly tapped a button with his finger. A second later, a screen saver popped up, the band logo for Act of Mercy. A skull with a bullet hole in its forehead. Nice.

“I see you’re a fan of criminals.” Torrance’s hawk eyes moved over the posters slowly, missing nothing. “Got some good ones here.”

“Um, are you guys allowed to be in here?” Blake’s gaze flickered back and forth between the two men. “My dad’s not home. That’s who you want, right?”

“Actually, I think it’s you we’re looking for,” Jerry said amiably.

“How are old you, son?” Torrance’s face was unreadable. His eyes scanned the posters a moment before coming back to Jeremiah Blake’s face.

“Eighteen.”

“Got any ID?”

“Why?”

Torrance sighed.

The kid reached for a pair of jeans crumpled beside the bed and fished around in the pockets. He pulled out a tattered wallet, and from that, a stained high school ID card. He handed it to Torrance, who scrutinized it before handing it to Jerry. Yup, this Jeremiah Blake was eighteen. Christ. Other than his height, he looked so much younger than that.

But the good news was, at eighteen, he could be questioned without parental supervision. Jerry handed the kid’s ID back to him.

“Who else lives here?” Torrance asked. “Besides you and your father?”

Blake swallowed, his large Adam’s apple bobbing painfully in his scrawny throat. “It’s just the two of us. My dad has a girlfriend that sleeps over sometimes, but not . . . not lately.”

“And what about you? Do you have a girlfriend who sleeps over sometimes?”

The kid’s face reddened. “I . . . I don’t have a girlfriend. Look, I think you guys should tell me why you’re here. Or else I . . . I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

Torrance smiled and looked away. It was Jerry’s cue to speak. “You’re a fan of Abby Maddox?” he asked, his voice a little less raspy than usual.

“Um. Who?”

Instinctively, Jerry stepped forward a couple of inches. Torrance stepped back. It was amazing how easy it was for them to slip back into their old routine.

“Abby Maddox,” Jerry said patiently. “You know, the infamous attempted murderess and girlfriend of the Tell-Tale Heart Killer. She’s been all over the news lately—TV, newspapers, Internet, blogs. You have at least a half a dozen pictures of her on your wall. Good job nailing the eye color, by the way.”

Jerry took another step toward him, prompting the kid to sit down on the bed since there was nowhere else to go. He looked up at the two men. “Yeah, I know who she is. Everybody does. So what?” Blake stared at Jerry sullenly, then suddenly his features lit up with recognition. “Hey, wait a minute. I know you! You’re . . . that guy. You’re the . . .”

Oh, to be eighteen and barely coherent
, Jerry thought, stifling a sigh. “Yep, I’m that guy.”

“You’re not a cop anymore.” Blake’s tone was accusatory. He
frowned, his eyes going right toward the ID clipped to Jerry’s breast pocket. “You’re just a—”

“He’s a cop on
this
case,” Torrance interjected smoothly. “That ID is real, son.”

“So you don’t think Abby Maddox deserves to be in prison.” Jerry looked down at the kid, who looked confused and desperately unhappy, as if he wished the bed would swallow him up. “You don’t think she’s guilty of attempting to murder me.”

“
Hells
no!” Blake said hotly, and once the words were out, his face turned a deeper shade of red. “It’s just . . . I’m sorry what happened to you and all, but come on, dude. She’s gotta be fucked up, you know? Being with Ethan Wolfe for so long. That’s bound to mess with her head.” He looked at Jerry earnestly. “I don’t think she meant to hurt you, honestly.”

Torrance wisely stepped forward. He placed a hand on Jerry’s shoulder and Jerry took a step back. “Was that your blog I just saw on your computer?
The Serial Killer Files
? What do you write about on there?”

“Serial killers, duh.” Blake scratched his head and little flakes of dandruff floated to his shoulders. “I do profiles. I guest post all the time on other sites, too. I’m pretty much the go-to guy for killers.” He lifted his chin, obviously proud of himself.

“Is that like a hobby?” Torrance asked. “Whatever happened to stamp collecting? Or sports?”

“It’s not a hobby, it’s my job. And killing
is
a sport,” the kid said with a grin. Jerry shuddered.

“Abby Maddox has heard about your blog, and she thinks you’re a total freak.” The lies rolled off the detective’s tongue with ease. When Blake showed surprise, he added, “She gave us all your letters, too. She said you’re a stalker and she wants you to stop writing her.”

“No way, she didn’t say that.” Blake started picking at a
pimple on his chin. “I never wrote anything bad, and I’ve only sent like a dozen. She’d never say that. Is that why you’re here?”

“Has she ever written you back?”

“No, but—”

“Why would you keep writing her, then? Wouldn’t you think that after the first, say, two letters, that if someone hasn’t written you back, it means they’re not interested?”

The kid’s thin shoulders slumped. The pimple on his chin was oozing blood and pus. He grabbed a tissue and pressed it to his face. “If she wanted me to stop, why wouldn’t she just tell me to stop.” It came out a statement, not a question, and the kid suddenly seemed defeated. Jerry almost felt sorry for him. Almost.

Blake looked up at Jerry. “Maybe when you see her next time, you could tell her I’m not a freak. Tell her I’m her biggest fan and I’ve written like, twenty blog posts about her. I think she’s amazing, and I’d love to interview her for my site. Will you tell her that?”

“That you’re not a freak? Sure, I’ll tell her.” Jerry kept his face expressionless. “As for the blog interview, you do know she’s not allowed to access the Internet, don’t you? How can she even read your blog?”

Blake’s face fell again and he was quiet for a moment. “Right,” he said. “Look, what do you guys want? I got stuff to do.”

Jerry pulled the chair from the desk and sat down across from him. “We want to know where you’ve been the last few days.”

The kid looked at Torrance as if he was wondering whether this was a real question. He looked back at Jerry. “I was home.”

“All week?”

“Yeah.”

“You don’t go to school? Work?”

“I work part-time at Fred Meyer.” Blake was referring to the locally owned Northwest superstore. “I’m a stock boy. At the one in Ballard.”

“But you weren’t working there this week.”

“Hells no. I was home.”

“Can anyone verify that?”

“No.” Blake began to fidget. “My dad works all the time. He works on a crab boat, and he’s gone for a couple weeks at a time. Look, what’s this about? Did something happen? Do you think I did something?”

Jerry stood up and put the chair back near the desk. “There was a murder downtown. A woman’s body was found in a hotel yesterday morning.”

“And you think
I
did it?” Blake finally stood up again, his ears red and his eyes wide with surprise, and maybe even a little excitement. His reaction disturbed Jerry. “Because I . . . I write a blog about serial killers and I have a boner for Abby Maddox? Like, who doesn’t? That’s kind of a . . . a . . .”

“Stretch?” Torrance said helpfully.

“Yeah,” Blake said, his head bobbing back and forth between Torrance and Jerry. “I’m not a murderer just because I
blog
about murderers.” His eyes widened. “Hey, is there some connection between Abby and the victim?”

It was a surprisingly intelligent question for a kid who didn’t seem that bright.

Torrance didn’t answer. Instead, he dug into his breast pocket. “How about a cheek swab?” He held up what looked like a long Q-tip wrapped in a skinny Ziploc bag. “Just so we can rule you out.”

The kid’s eyes showed real fear. “You want my DNA?”

“It just takes a second. One swipe and this all goes away. We’ll never have to bother you again.”

“I don’t know.” Jeremiah Blake’s eyes were darting all over the place, reminding Jerry of a rabbit stuck in a hole. “I . . . I guess.”

“Great.” Torrance leaned in. “Open up.” The kid did as he was instructed and Torrance swabbed the inside of his cheek. Sticking the Q-tip back in the plastic bag, Torrance sealed it and put it back in his pocket. “Thanks for being so cooperative. We’ll get out of your hair now. Listen, stay available, okay? Don’t go anywhere or it’ll look really suspicious. We might have to chat with you again.”

The two men made their way out of the room and back down the hall, where the air seemed fresher. Blake followed behind.

“Hey, can I do an interview with you?” The kid touched Jerry’s arm. “I think my readers would want to know your side of the story. I don’t know if you’ve been keeping up, but, like, dude, you don’t really come across as a nice guy in the press.”

“
Hells
no,” Jerry said, closing the door behind him.

JEREMIAH BLAKE WAS
one creepy kid.

Jerry had been scrolling through the eighteen-year-old’s blog for the past hour, and he was starting to feel like he needed a hot shower with disinfectant soap and a good scrub with one of those scratchy long-handled sponges. While the kid’s writing was good, the content was damned twisted. Detailed profiles of serial killers, dissections of killing methods and crime scenes . . . was this what kids were into these days?
The Serial Killer Files
was a very active blog—lively discussions ensued in the comments section after every post. Jerry didn’t think he’d ever understand why people were so turned on by death.

There were voices out in the reception area and he wondered who was here. Torrance had asked him to work at an unoccupied desk at the East Precinct, but Jerry had declined, preferring the familiarity and comfort of his own office. The last time he’d been at the precinct had been the night Maddox had—

He scratched his throat and forced the thought out of his mind. A few seconds later, Torrance poked his head in.

“Busy?”

Jerry peeled his dry eyes away from the computer, grateful for the distraction. “How’d it go with the neighbor?”

Torrance lumbered into the office and plopped himself
into the chair across from Jerry’s desk. He’d stayed behind on Palmer Lane to talk to the man who lived next door to the Blakes. “Went well. He was only too happy to dish.”