Genesis (24 page)

W
ILL HAD FORCED HIMSELF TO GET UP AT HIS USUAL TIME
of five o'clock. His run had been sluggish, his shower far from bracing.
He was standing over the kitchen sink, his breakfast cereal soggy
in the bowl, when Betty nudged his ankle to stir him from his stupor.

He found Betty's leash by the door and stooped down to clip it
onto her collar. She licked his hand, and despite himself, he petted
her little head. Everything about the Chihuahua was an embarrassment.
She was the kind of dog a young starlet would carry in a
leather satchel, hardly Will's speed. Making it worse, she was roughly
six inches off the ground, and the only leash at the pet store that was
long enough for him to comfortably hold came in hot pink. The fact
that it matched her rhinestone collar was something many attractive
women had pointed out to him in the park—right before they'd tried
to set up Will with their brothers.

Betty had been an inheritance of sorts, abandoned by Will's next door
neighbor a couple of years ago. Angie had hated the dog on
sight, and chastised Will for what they both knew was the truth: a
man who was raised in an orphanage was not going to drop off a dog
at the pound, no matter how ridiculous he felt when they were out in
public.

There were more shameful aspects about his life with the dog that
even Angie did not know about. Will worked odd hours, and sometimes
when a case was breaking, he barely had time to go home and
change his shirt. He had dug the pond in the backyard for Betty,
thinking that watching the fish swim would be a nice way for her to
pass the time. She had barked at the fish for a couple of days, but then
she'd gone back to sitting on the couch, whiling away the hours until
Will came home.

He half suspected the animal was playing him, that she jumped on
the couch when she heard his key in the lock, pretending that she'd
been waiting there all day when in fact she had been running in and
out of the dog door, romping it up with the koi in the backyard, listening
to his music.

Will patted his pockets, making sure he had his phone and wallet,
then clipped his paddle holster onto his belt. He left the house, locking
the door behind him. Betty's tail was pointed in the air, swishing
back and forth like crazy, as he walked her toward the park. He
checked the time on his cell phone. He was supposed to meet Faith at
the coffee shop across from the park in half an hour. When cases were
in full swing, he usually had her pick him up there instead of home.
If Faith ever noticed that the coffee shop was right beside a dog day
care center called Sir Barks-A-Lot, she'd been kind enough not to
mention it.

They crossed the street against the light, Will slowing his pace so
he didn't run over the dog, much as he had done with Amanda the
day before. He did not know which was worrying him more—the
case, which they had very little to go on, or the fact that Faith was
obviously mad at him. God knew Faith had been mad before, but this
particular anger had a tinge of disappointment to it.

He felt her pushing him, even though she wouldn't say the words.
The problem was that she was a different cop than Will was. He had
long known that his less aggressive way of approaching the job was at
odds with her own, but rather than being a point of contention, it
was a contrast that had worked for them both. Now, he wasn't so
sure. Faith wanted him to be one of those kinds of cops that Will
despised—someone who goes in with his fists swinging and worries
about the consequences later. Will hated those cops, had worked
more than a few cases where he'd gotten them kicked off the force.
You couldn't say you were one of the good guys if you did the same
thing the bad guys did. Faith had to know this. She'd grown up in a
cop's family. Then again, her mother had been forced out of the job
for improper conduct, so maybe Faith did know it and just didn't
care.

Will couldn't accept that reasoning. Faith was not just a solid cop;
she was a good person. She still insisted her mother was innocent.
She still believed that there was a distinct line between good and bad,
right and wrong. Will couldn't just tell her that his way was best—
she would have to see it for herself.

He had never walked a beat like Faith, but he had walked into
plenty of small communities and learned the hard way that you don't
piss off the locals. By law, the GBI was called in by the bosses, not the
detectives and patrolmen on the street. They were invariably still
working their cases, still thinking they could crack it on their own
and highly resentful of any outside interference. Chances were, you
would need something from them later on, and if you left them in
the gutter, took away all chances of them saving face, they would actively
work to sabotage you, damn the consequences.

Case in point was Rockdale County. Amanda had made an enemy
of Lyle Peterson, the chief of police, while she was working another
case with him. Now that they needed cooperation from the local
force, Rockdale was balking in the form of Max Galloway, who was
straddling the line between being a jerk and being grossly negligent.

What Faith needed to realize was that the cops weren't always
selfless in their actions. They had egos. They had territories. They
were like animals marking their spots: if you encroached on their
space, they didn't care about the bodies stacking up. It was just a
game to some of them, one they had to win no matter who was hurt
in the process.

As if she could read his mind, Betty stopped near the entrance of
Piedmont Park to do her business. Will waited, then took care of the
mess, dropping the bag into one of the trashcans as they cut through
the park. Joggers were out in force, some with dogs, some alone.
They were all bundled up to fight the cold in the air, though Will
could tell from the way the sun was burning off the fog that it would
be warm enough by noon so that his collar started to rub against his
neck.

The case was twenty-four hours old and he and Faith had a full
day—talk to Rick Sigler, the paramedic who had been on the scene
when Anna was hit by the car, track down Jake Berman, Sigler's
hook-up, then interview Joelyn Zabel, Jacquelyn Zabel's awful sister.
Will knew he shouldn't make snap judgments, but he'd seen the
woman all over the television news last night, both local and national.
Apparently, Joelyn liked to talk. Even more apparently, she
liked to blame. Will was grateful he had been at the autopsy yesterday,
had had the burden of Jacquelyn Zabel's death removed from his
long list of burdens, or the sister's words would have cut into him like
a thousand knives.

He wanted to search Pauline McGhee's house, but Leo Donnelly
would probably protest. There had to be a way around that, and if
there was any one thing Will wanted to do today, it was find a way to
bring Leo on board. Rather than sleep, Will had thought about
Pauline McGhee most of last night. Every time he closed his eyes, he
mixed up the cave and McGhee, so that she was on that wooden bed,
tied down like an animal, while Will stood helplessly by. His gut was
telling him that something was going on with McGhee. She had run
away once before, twenty years ago, but she had roots now. Felix was
a good kid. His mother would not leave him.

Will chuckled to himself. He of all people should know that
mothers left their sons all the time.

"Come on," he said, tugging Betty's leash, pulling her away from
a pigeon that was almost as big as she was.

He tucked his hand into his pocket to warm it, his mind staying
focused on the case. Will wasn't stupid enough to take full credit for
the majority of the arrests he made. The fact was that people who
committed crimes tended to be stupid. Most killers made mistakes,
because they usually were acting on the spur of the moment. A fight
broke out, a gun was handy, tempers flared and the only thing to figure
out when it was all over was whether or not the prosecution was
going to go for second- or first-degree murder.

Stranger abductions were different, though. They were harder to
solve, especially when there was more than once victim. Serial
killers, by definition, were good at their jobs. They knew they were
going to murder. They knew who they were going to kill and exactly
how they were going to do it. They had practiced their trade
over and over again, perfecting their skills. They knew how to evade
detection, to hide evidence or simply leave nothing at all. Finding
them tended to be a matter of dumb luck on the part of law enforcement
or complacency in the killer.

Ted Bundy had been captured during a routine traffic stop.
Twice. BTK, who signed his letters taunting the cops by those initials,
indicating he liked to bind, torture and kill his victims, was
tripped up by a computer disc he accidentally gave his pastor.
Richard Ramirez was beaten by a vigilante whose car he tried to
steal. All captured by happenstance, all with several murders under
their belts before they were stopped. In most serial cases, years
passed, and the only thing the police could do was wait for more
bodies to show up, pray that happenstance brought the killers to
justice.

Will thought about what they had on their guy: a white sedan
speeding down the road, a torture chamber in the middle of
nowhere, elderly witnesses who could offer nothing usable. Jake
Berman could be a lead, but they might never find him. Rick Sigler
was squeaky clean except for being a couple of months behind on his
mortgage, hardly shocking considering how bad the economy was.
The Coldfields were, on paper, exemplars of an average retired couple.
Pauline McGhee had a brother she was worried about, but then
she might be worried about him for reasons that had nothing to do
with their case. She might not have anything to do with their case at
all.

The physical evidence was equally as thin. The trash bags found in
the victims were of the sort you would find in any grocery or convenience
store. The items in the cave, from the marine battery to the
torture devices, were completely untraceable. There were plenty of
fingerprints and fluids to enter into the computer, but nothing was
coming back as a match. Sexual predators were sneaky, inventive.
Almost eighty percent of the crimes solved by DNA evidence were
actually burglaries, not assaults. Glass was broken, kitchen knives
were mishandled, Chapstick was dropped—all inevitably leading
back to the burglar, who generally already had a long record. But,
with stranger rape, where the victim had no previous contact with
the assailant, it was looking for a needle in a haystack.

Betty had stopped so she could sniff around some tall grass by the
lake. Will glanced up, seeing a runner coming toward them. She was
wearing long black tights and a neon green jacket. Her hair was
pulled up under a matching ball cap. Two greyhounds jogged beside
her, heads up, tails straight. They were beautiful animals, sleek, long-legged,
muscled. Just like their owner.

"Crap," Will muttered, scooping up Betty in his hand, holding
her behind his back.

Sara Linton stopped a few feet away, the dogs heeling beside her
like trained commandos. The only thing Will had ever been able to
teach Betty to do was eat.

"Hi," Sara said, her voice going up in surprise. When he didn't respond,
she asked, "Will?"

"Hi." He could feel Betty licking his palm.

Sara studied him. "Is that a Chihuahua behind your back?"

"No, I'm just happy to see you."

Sara gave him a confused smile, and he reluctantly showed her
Betty.

Noises were made, some cooing, and Will waited for the usual
question.

"Is she your wife's?"

"Yes," he lied. "Do you live around here?"

"The Milk Lofts off North Avenue."

She lived less than two blocks from his house. "You don't seem
like a loft person."

The confused look returned. "What do I seem like?"

Will had never been particularly skilled at the art of conversation,
and he certainly didn't know how to articulate what Sara Linton
seemed like to him—at least not without making a fool of himself.

He shrugged, setting Betty down on the ground. Sara's dogs
stirred, and she clicked her tongue once, sending them back to attention.
Will told her, "I'd better go. I'm meeting Faith at the coffee
place across the park."

"Mind if I walk with you?" She didn't wait for an answer. The
dogs stood and Will picked up Betty, knowing she would only slow
them down. Sara was tall, nearly shoulder-to-shoulder with him. He
tried to do some calculations without staring. Angie could almost
put her chin on his shoulder if she raised up on her tiptoes. Sara
would've had to make very little effort to do the same. Her mouth
could have reached his ear if she wanted it to.

"So." She took off her hat, tightened her ponytail. "I've been
thinking about the trash bags."

Will glanced her way. "What about them?"

"It's a powerful message."

Will hadn't thought of them as a message—more like a horror.
"He thinks they're trash."

"And what he does to them—takes away their senses."

Will glanced at her again.

"See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil."

He nodded, wondering why he hadn't thought about it that way.

She continued, "I've been wondering if there's some kind of religious
angle to this. Actually, something Faith said that first night got
me thinking about it. God took Adam's rib to make Eve."

"Vesalius," Will mumbled.

Sara laughed in surprise. "I haven't heard that name since my first
year in medical school."

Will shrugged, saying a silent prayer of thanks that he'd managed
to catch the History Channel's
Great Men of Science
week. Andreas
Vesalius was an anatomist who, among other things, proved that men
and women have the same number of ribs. The Vatican almost put
him in prison for his discovery.