Husk (13 page)

She glanced over at BJ while her dad buckled him into his booster-seat. He sat slack-faced, still acting distant, not himself. This morning she’d overheard him mention something new about the pool incident, something about clothing in the water, but she couldn’t remember seeing any.

She settled into the front passenger seat and once again turned her attention toward the house across the street when they pulled out of the driveway.

“
What do you think happened over there?” she asked.

“
I don’t know,” her father replied.

“
Voodooman,” BJ said.

Mallory could tell her dad didn’t approve of the boy’s remark, but he didn’t comment on it.

“
Let’s go,” he said. “Next stop, The Mall.”

* * *

Melissa strolled through Mr. Anderson’s den, a cozy room on the first floor styled with Scandinavian décor: unvarnished pine woodwork, exposed beam ceiling, forest green carpeting, stone fireplace in the corner. She’d learned from Mr. Fish that Jerry Anderson held the title of
Judge
within the Minnesota judicial system, although he’d been retired from the bench for several years now. From what she understood, he had no connection to Kane whatsoever.

She looked up and found Rictor standing in the doorway.

“
I could hear the gears in your head turning all the way from the driveway,” he said.

Melissa forced a smile. “How’s it going out there?”

“
Better than at the farmhouse,” he answered. “We’ve retrieved three bullets from the upstairs bedroom and the M.E. gave us an estimated time of death on the priest. I’d still like to get my hands on their vehicle, though; any word on the van?”

“
I put out a BOLO report,” she replied. “Now it’s a time issue. Have you found any K markings?”

“
No.”

“
Me either.”

“
Perhaps these two incidents aren’t related.”

“
I’m not ruling anything out until we locate the Andersons or their van.”

Rictor nodded.

Melissa perused the room, still mulling over the feeble facts.

Late afternoon sunlight streamed in through the den’s window, illuminating dust particles that drifted in the air. The yellow beam ended at the far wall, beside the Judge’s desk, where it spotlighted a variety of reference books. Melissa’s gaze glided across the binders displayed on the lowest shelf—where law books and encyclopedias gave way to mystery novels—and focused on a small stack of paperbacks resting on the floor.

Kane’s name appeared in irregular black lettering across the spine of the fifth book in the stack.

If not for the sun’s rays reflecting off the book’s glossy red binding, she might not have noticed it so quickly. She hurried across the room.

“
What is it, Detective?” Rictor asked.

“
Look at this.”

She picked up the entire collection of books and transferred them to the Judge’s desk. On top sat a work about modern-day voodoo entitled
The Risen Dead,
followed by a book called
Flesheaters,
which had something to do with ancient tribes and human sacrifices.

“
Grimly ironic subjects, huh?” Rictor remarked.

The title,
The Lost World of the Aztecs,
adorned the cover of the third volume in the stack—stamped in bright gold lettering—and it sat atop a thick reference work on
Gnosticism
. Next came the one Melissa had spotted,
A Killer’s Shadow, the arrest of Kale Kane,
by Frank Atkins.

Frank Atkins.

Melissa knew the name well. Detective Atkins had been the man who’d originally ended Kane’s string of kidnappings and murders. Frank had even been on one of the reserve tactical teams that stormed the killer’s farm in Stillwater. Melissa vaguely remembered hearing Atkins had been injured in the raid, and later retired from police work altogether. She had no idea he’d written a book on the madman.

“
Have you ever seen this?” she asked Rictor.

He frowned at the cover and nodded. “Yes, some time ago—a year or two after the shootout.”

She opened the cover and noticed a yellow post-it note stuck to the inside that included Frank’s name and a phone number.

“
It didn’t do too good on the market, if I remember correctly,” Rictor continued. “I recall seeing an interview Channel 9 did with the man a few months after it was published. He looked haggard, tired. I guess he got a lot of criticism for his writing. The local papers seemed ruthless about smearing his name.”

Melissa flipped the copy over and found a picture of a handsome man with thick black hair, passive eyes, and a thoughtful expression printed on the back cover. He looked more like a concerned psychiatrist than a cop.

“
Did you ever work with him?” Melissa asked, looking to Rictor. “He’d already retired by the time I transferred here from Chicago, but I still hear his name in conversation from time to time.”

Rictor shook his head. “I was still a medical examiner in St. Paul back then. I did manage to get a look at one of Kane’s victims while Detective Atkins was on the case, though. One of the
amalgamates
, as my colleague referred to it.”

Melissa eyed him. “
Amalgamate?
”

Rictor nodded. “Remind me to show you a photo sometime; we had to call in a special veterinarian surgeon to aid in the autopsy. Now that I think of it, it was that experience that drove me out of the morgue and made me want to work in the field with CSI.”

Melissa shuddered at the mention of Kane’s butchery and redirected her attention to the slim paperback in her gloved hand. A moment later she glanced at the remaining piles of books on the floor.

Frank’s seemed to be the only one not based on the supernatural.

Yet the main subject sounded just as scary.

CHAPTER 18

Mallory met with Becky outside of Nordstrom’s.

“
Back here at six,” her dad said when he dropped her off, then she hurried away with Becky.

Inside, they flowed with the crowds, updating each other on the current events of their lives. They hit all their favorite shops, spending sporadically, talking, checking out guys. Becky teased her with some new info about Derrick but then confessed that she didn’t really have anything to report.

At three, they saw
Glade’s Bend
in the mall’s theater complex then relocated to the food court to get something to eat. A group of older boys leaning on the low wall beside the escalator whistled when they walked past and Becky soaked up the attention as if it was sunshine.

“
I think that was for you,” Becky said after they ordered their food, “but if you don’t want it, I’m happy to take the credit.”

Mallory shrugged and paid the cashier.

They sat at a table overlooking the huge central atrium that housed the paths, trees, fountains, game areas, and amusement park rides in the middle of the building.

“
Why so spacey?” Becky asked while they ate.

“
What do you mean?”

Becky made a casual gesture to the left. “That dude over there just flashed you his dong, and you totally missed it.”

Mallory gaped at her. “What?”

Becky laughed. “That’s what I mean. You’re in orbit. What’s the deal?”

She sighed and put down her fork. “Well, it’s just that—”

She stopped herself and looked around, making sure they were alone. She leaned forward. “If I tell you something kind of strange, do you promise not to freak?”

“
Look who you’re talking to,” Becky replied.

Mallory took another swallow of her drink, biding an extra second. “I’ve been having these really messed up dreams lately,” she confessed. “Nightmares. I can’t even explain how awful they’ve been. But last night … last night I dreamed about being with a girl.”

Becky talked around her straw as she sipped her own drink. “What, like hanging out or getting nasty?”

“
Nasty,” Mallory whispered.

Becky’s mouth dropped open. “For real? It wasn’t about
me,
was it?”

Mallory didn’t laugh. “No. It was this older girl with purple hair, Penelope. Penelope Styles.”

“
Who’s that?”

“
I don’t know. She in each of the dreams, though.”

“
So what happened?”

Mallory looked at her food rather than meet Becky’s inquisitor-like stare. “Well, we were in this strange room. It was like someplace underground, with stone walls and fires burning around the room. There was this raised area in the middle with animal furs on it that I guess was supposed to be a bed. Anyway, we were kissing. Really kissing. I’m talking tongue knots. And we were …” She cleared her throat and continued at a lower volume. “We were naked, and after a while Penelope, you know, went down on me.”

Becky gawked at her.

Mallory shifted in her seat. “The sensation was so intense that when I woke up I think I had an orgasm.”

“
You slut!”

Mallory glanced around, expecting to find the whole restaurant staring at her. “Would you keep your voice down. Shit, I knew I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“
No, no,” Becky apologized. “I’m sorry. Did anything else happen?”

Mallory nodded, staring at her friend across the table, shivering at the memory of what came next. “I killed her,” she said.

Becky’s smile slid away. “Why?”

“
I don’t know. I just grabbed her by the hair and slammed her face into the stone corner of the bedpost until there was nothing left to hold onto.”

Becky sat speechless.

“
But it wasn’t really me,” Mallory rushed to explain. “It was like I was watching myself through someone else’s eyes, seeing me how they
wanted
me to be.”

Becky put down the sandwich half she’d been working on, rolled the remains of the food back into its wrapper. She pushed it aside. “You’re right. That is messed up.”

“
I know it is,” Mallory replied. “That’s why I’m so out of it. I’ve been trying to imagine how I’d come up with something so twisted.”

“
Hey, it was a dream. A wacko dream, but that’s it. It doesn’t mean anything.”

Mallory shook her head. “I can still recall every detail. It was more like reliving a memory than having a dream.”

“
So we’ll get your mind off it. Will your dad let you come over tonight?”

Mallory shook her head again. “I can’t. I sort of have plans.”

Becky raised an eyebrow.

“
I’m going out with someone.”

“
Who?”

“
A boy from the neighborhood.”

“
You’ve got a date! This whole time and you haven’t said anything!”

“
It’s not a big deal.”

Becky picked up her drink. “I swear I’ll douse you with this.”

Mallory laughed. She recounted BJ’s episode in the pool the other day and how Tim had come to his rescue. Becky listened wide-eyed.

“
Holy shit, Mallory, why didn’t you tell me this earlier? And what about this Tim guy; is he hot?”

Mallory smiled. “I didn’t tell you because I knew this is how you’d react. I also didn’t want to make a big deal about it because I feel like I’m being a tease or something.”

“
Why?”

“
Because I think Tim likes me,” Mallory confessed. “He’s such a nice guy I couldn’t say no to him, especially not after what he did for BJ. But I’m still thinking about Derrick. I don’t know. I guess I feel like I’m leading him on. What should I do?”

Becky laughed. “You just met the dude. You don’t have to marry him.”

Mallory groaned. “I’m talking about not hurting his feelings.”

“
The best advice I’ve got for you is to go with whichever one’s cuter.”

“
Thanks a lot,” Mallory replied. She glanced to her watch. “It’s almost six,” she said. “We better get moving.”

CHAPTER 19

Melissa pulled into the Garden Park Condominium complex in Hopkins, the last known address of Frank Atkins.

She got out of the car. The sun had already begun its descent toward the horizon, but the humidity in the air held the heat index at well above ninety. Plenty of people crowded in and around the condo community’s nearby swimming pool, but when she scanned their happy faces, she didn’t spot Frank among them.

She turned toward the condos themselves, a series of two-story brick buildings outfitted with Cape Cod-style wood siding along their upper levels in an apparent effort to add curb appeal to the property. Frank lived in unit six of building 920. With no security door to impede her progress, Melissa marched directly inside and checked the mailbox cluster to her left. She counted eight units per building, four upstairs and four down. She located the box for number six and found “Atkins” on the ID label.

Good, he’s still here.

From the information she’d received, she knew he hadn’t married, lived alone, and had kept little contact with his coworkers after he retired. She hoped he’d be cooperative.