Murder 42 - A Thriller (Sarah King Mysteries Book 2) (9 page)

18

Destin was the nicest restaurant Sarah had ever been to. It sat on the beach not fifty feet from the water, and the patio looked out over the ocean. Farther down the beach were other restaurants and businesses, and it looked as though teenagers were out looking for something to do. Sitting on the hoods of their cars, hanging out on the sand, or slowly driving down the road and honking at friends, it looked like a scene from the 1950s rather than modern America.

They were seated on the patio, and Stefan ordered a beer. A cold beer sounded as divine as anything right now, but Sarah resisted. Instead she got a cranberry juice and decided on ordering something light.

“So you have to tell me,” Stefan said, “what exactly you’re consulting on. You said you’re not a profiler, but Gio won’t make a move without you. It’s like you’re his good luck charm or something.”

She chuckled. “That’s probably as accurate a description as there is.”

He leaned forward, putting his elbows on the table. “What are you doing here, Sarah? Really.”

She hesitated. The word “psychic” wasn’t one she liked using; it had too many negative connotations from too many fakes and swindlers, but there really wasn’t another word that described her.

She took a breath and said, “I’m… a psychic.”

Stefan didn’t react for a moment, then he burst out laughing. After a few seconds, he nodded and said, “Okay, I get it, it’s not for me to know.”

“No, I’m telling the truth.”

He stared at her a long time. “Sorry I laughed. It’s just… Well, you know.”

“Yeah, I do.”

The waiter came and took their order. Sarah asked for a salad and a bowl of clam chowder while Stefan ordered a steak. When the waiter left and they were alone again, Stefan looked out over the ocean.

“Must’ve been nice living here,” she said. “Were you born here?”

He shook his head, his eyes still on the sea. “We moved out here when my parents divorced, and I lived with my mother. She remarried right away, some hippy cop into the free-love movement. Of course he cheated on her constantly. Then my mom started to cheat on him. That’s what California does to people. Something happens to them where morality just slowly slips away, like a Band-Aid sliding off. You don’t even notice it.”

“Wow. That is incredibly depressing.”

He laughed.

“You must be wild at parties,” she said with a grin.

“I guess that’s why I don’t get invited to many parties.”

“Really? I never would’ve guessed.”

“Believe it or not, this burnin’ hunk of man love flies solo most of the time.”

“So there’s no Mrs. Stefan?”

The drinks came, and he took a long swallow of beer. “Nope. Never married. You?”

“Same.”

“Who needs it, right? Somebody sitting on the couch when you walk in, yelling at you about not doing the dishes.”

She chuckled. “You think that’s what marriage is?”

“Well, that’s what it was for my mom and the hippy cop.”

“Did they stay married?”

“Yes, actually. For twenty-two years. Both totally cheating on each other, and neither of them saying anything about it. Maybe that’s the key? Sleep with as many people as you can while you’re married and don’t discuss it.”

“Maybe. Seems like that’d be unhealthy, though.”

He shrugged. “Who knows?” He paused. “What about your parents?”

She looked down at the table, a single, painful memory searing into her mind like a hot needle. “My mother died. My father’s still alive, but we don’t talk.”

He nodded. “I’m sorry,” he said softly.

“Talk about not being fun at parties,” she said sadly. Taking a sip of her cranberry juice, she looked out over the ocean and counted five waves before either of them spoke again.

“That video,” Sarah said, “have you ever seen anything like it?”

“That violent and disgusting? No. But I’ve seen rape and cannibalism filmed before, sure. My first case with the ViCAP unit was a man who filmed himself breaking into single women’s homes and then torturing them for hours. He didn’t care if they lived or died. For him, it was the torture. If they died, he mutilated them as, like, punishment, I guess, for not being strong enough to survive the torture. He would film it sometimes, and we got hold of one of the films.”

“Wow. How’d you catch him?”

“He set fire to a woman’s body inside her apartment. He had tortured her and cut off her head. One of the firemen, while it was really smoky and he couldn’t see very well, tried to give her mouth-to-mouth before he realized it was just a bloody stump where the head used to be.” He thought a moment. “Poor guy quit being a fireman after that.” He leaned back and took a swig of beer. “Anyway, a witness saw the torturer jump into his car and take off. Witness was smart enough to take a picture of the license plate with his phone. When I showed up at his house, he just smiled and held out his wrists for the cuffs. Didn’t fight, didn’t argue or deny it. That was the weirdest thing for me—that he knew he would be caught one day and he still couldn’t control it. Just pure evil.”

She nodded. “I wonder if sometimes the same person can be evil and good. I bet there were good things about that man’s life, and he also committed great evil. Maybe both are aspects of all of us.”

“I doubt it. My experience says people are generally good or generally evil. No real middle ground. Of course, the psychologists give different explanations: problems with early childhood trauma or brain damage, or misfiring of the triune brain, whatever. But it all says the same thing—they’re evil.” He bit his lower lip, his eyes never leaving hers. “So tell me about this psychic thing.”

“Not much to tell.”

“Really? If it’s true, it means everything we know about the universe is wrong. I’d say there’s a lot there to tell. So do you get impressions or talk to the dead or something?”

“It’s hard to explain.”

“Try. I’m really interested.”

She thought for a moment. “It’s like when you don’t want to think about something, but then that thought pops into your head. You don’t control it; it’s just there. Sometimes I’ll walk into a building, and I’ll see what happened in there fifty years ago. Sometimes I’ll see people that have… passed. A few of them talk to me, a few more don’t say anything. Some of them are violent. They’re frightened and don’t know what’s going on.” She paused. “And sometimes there’s places where so much darkness has occurred that it overwhelms me. My body and mind shut down, probably some protective mechanism. Too much pain can do that.”

He leaned forward. “You see people who’ve died?”

“Sometimes.”

“So, like right now, are you seeing anything?”

She grinned. “You know, most people just think I’m crazy. They don’t start asking questions like they believe me.”

“I do believe you.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. I just do.”

The food came. Everything tasted fresh, as though it’d just been pulled from the sea or plucked from the ground. They ate and laughed, Stefan telling anecdotes about his life growing up in southern California, seeing celebrities run naked down the street at big parties or watching small bands play in a garage and later go on to become famous. The conversation was casual, not forced in any way.

But what stuck out to Sarah was that he seemed to genuinely believe her when she told him about the things she saw and heard. He didn’t call her crazy, or question whether it was all in her head, or ask if she was a swindler just trying to get her own television show. He listened quietly as Sarah recounted her first experience that couldn’t be explained and what her life was like as a child.

“So you didn’t have any friends?” he asked.

“Not really. They were frightened of me, and I guess I don’t blame them. If I were in their shoes, I might react the same way.”

“No you wouldn’t. I can tell. It’s all in the eyes. Everything people believe, everything they’re capable of, it’s all in the eyes. Psychopaths can hide almost everything about themselves except their eyes. You can see that darkness there, that complete incomprehension of empathy. They just don’t understand why someone would care about another person. But your eyes, I can see almost nothing but empathy. Like you care too much, and it’s hurting you.”

The two of them gazed at each other a moment before she said, “I think we should go. Gio’s probably waiting for us.”

“If we have to,” he said.

“I think we do.”

He nodded, and they rose from the table.

19

When Sarah and Stefan rolled to a stop in front of California Bill’s home, Gio was outside. He was on a cell phone, and he said a few more words and hung up before approaching them.

“Where you guys been?”

“Just got something to eat,” Stefan said. “You looked like you had it handled.”

Gio looked from one to the other. “You can go where you want, Special Agent Miles, but don’t take her without my permission.”

“She’s not a car, sir. I don’t think you can make that demand.”

The two men glared at each other. Sarah stared at Gio and said, “I’m not your property, and I’m here as a favor to you. And as flattering as it is to have you two fighting about whether I can or can’t go out on my own, neither of you have a say in it.”

Gio looked back at Stefan, and his jaw muscles tightened for a second and then relaxed. He stepped away from the car and said, “Sorry.” He paused. “We’re done here, there’s nothing.”

“What now?” Stefan said.

“The owners of Naughty Nancy’s are lying. Bill showed me an invoice where they made a specific request for deviant videos. I don’t think Bill called them up and sent them anything, I think they asked for it. And they probably asked for the
Murder 42
video from someone, too. The SPD didn’t have any tails on them. Maybe we follow them around and get lucky.”

Stefan nodded. “You ready to head back?”

“No, I’ve got some things to close up at the field office. I’ll meet you at the airport in a couple hours. If you get a flight before then, take it.”

Stefan looked at Sarah. “You wanna come with me or stay with him?”

She opened the door and got out. “There’s a few more things I’d like to see before leaving.”

“No worries,” Stefan said. “I’ll you see you guys at the airport.”

Gio waited until he had driven away before speaking. “Where’d you guys go?”

“Destin.”

“Was it as nice as he said?”

She nodded. “Nicer.”

Gio put his hands on his hips and looked down at the gravel. “Putting a tail on the owners isn’t a plan. It’s a Hail Mary. We can’t get anything from the video, we can’t ID the vic and the perp never shows his face, we can’t get the people who sold the video to talk, and the one that owned it claims he had no idea who made it. We’re stuck. And the longer we’re stuck, the more certain it is this is going to become a cold case. It’ll move to the Open/Unsolved unit and just sit there for twenty years until some agent in the future has a little time and decides to look at it again.”

“If you’re asking, just ask.”

He looked her in the eyes. “I need you to tell me if the owners are lying.”

She looked at the house. “First, you’re going to take me somewhere. Somewhere I’ve always wanted to go.”

“Where?”

The streets were lined with palm trees so perfect Sarah thought they were the archetypes of palm trees, some imagined tree on which all other palm trees were based. The sky was black, but the surrounding lights were so bright it didn’t matter.

The entire two blocks they’d driven looked like some picture-perfect European town from a previous century. Everything in its place, everything kept in prime condition.

“You’ve always wanted to go to Disneyland?” Gio said.

She smiled. “You’d be amazed how magical this place seems to a kid growing up in Amish country.”

“I can imagine. I’m not even sure the park is open.”

“I don’t care. I just want to see it.”

Gio turned up a street near the entrance. A tram zipped by, and Sarah watched it until it was gone. Families were pouring out of the park. Some of the children were crying because they didn’t want to leave, and others were skipping because they couldn’t hold their elation in.

“This is sad,” Gio said.

“What?”

“You’ve wanted to come here your entire life and you have to see it from the parking lot.”

“I didn’t expect it to be open.”

“Forget that, let’s go.”

Gio got out of the car and walked around and opened her door. She got out and said, “Go where?”

“Follow me.”

Gio took her hand and led her through the parking lot to the entrance. Security and some park employees were standing around. Gio hurried over to them and pulled out the wallet that contained his badge and spoke to one of the security personnel. The man nodded, and Gio walked back to Sarah.

“Let’s go, they’re letting us in.”

They hurried past the entrance and into a courtyard that contained restaurants and shops. Again, everything was perfect. She didn’t even see trash on the streets.

“How’d you do that?”

“Being a federal agent has its perks.”

California Adventure was closed, but they got to go on a
Toy Story
ride. It was clearly intended for small children, and Sarah had to admit she didn’t know what
Toy Story
was.

“Believe it or not, it’s actually a great movie. I saw it with my nephew.”

They didn’t speak as they ran around, begging whatever employee they could find to let them into their attraction. But it wasn’t lost on Sarah that they held hands nearly the entire time. The crew were cleaning the park, and Sarah managed to get some cotton candy from a vendor cleaning up when she saw the castle.

It was all exactly as she had pictured it, as though torn from her dreams—vivid colors and sharp spirals poking into the sky. Not as large as she had imagined but certainly as beautiful. They crossed the bridge into the castle, but the doors were closed. She ran into the courtyard and looked up from the other side.

“I feel like I’m five years old,” she said.

“This place’ll do that to you.”

She watched him, the way his hands casually dipped into his pockets, the gleam in his eyes from the lights, one foot lazily thrown behind the other. Utterly calm, utterly collected and together. Sarah ran to him, placed her hands on either side of his face, and kissed him.

“Sorry,” she said, pulling away.

“No, I’m glad you did it before I could.”

She smiled. “Thank you for this.”

He nodded and grinned. “You wanna see if we can sneak into ‘It’s a Small World’?”