SACRIFICES (15 page)

                                          “Thanks.” Brad Jr. closes the door.

“You’re welcome.” Brad smiles and finishes opening the box. He walks into the living room. He examines the box carefully and then checks the tape. It looks to be ok so he turns on the TV and places the tape into the VCR.

Brad grabs the remote and sits in his chair having no idea what to expect. He pushes play. There’s a few seconds of static then an image appears. The image is that of what appears to be someone walking up to a house. He can’t make out any faces yet, but whoever is taping this is walking toward a house. The camera view starts to show the side of a house then the angle follows the siding up to a window.

The view now shows the camera focusing on a young lady walking through her kitchen into what appears to be a living room or a family room. The curtains distort the image. Brad starts to fast-forward and stops as the camera is focused on what appears to be a basement window. Now it turns into a show on how to break into a basement window. Someone wearing black gloves takes out a knife and starts to insert it into the latch of the metal frame. After a few seconds the window opens out.

                            Brad continues to watch. And he fast-forwards. He’s unable to make out a face until the almost black screen gets brighter as it appears that the camera has moved into a lighted room. He watches and watches and subsequently it appears that the person holding the camera has sat it down.

Then from behind the cameras view out walks a person wearing all black and carrying a white rag. Following that the dark image runs at the woman that just walked into camera view and the person wearing all black has started to hold the rag over the mouth and nose of the young lady. There’s a lot of struggling on the part of the girl that looks like the girl in Canton that was raped.

The image is distorted but Brad can tell that the woman that was struggling has stopped her moving. The person dressed in all black at this point walks back to behind the camera and it appears to be moving the camera. Next the screen goes black. The view of the camera placed on the floor didn’t give him a good prospective on how big the guy was or his build. Maybe the lab guys can blow it up to get some comparisons to the girl’s height in Canton he thinks.

Brad realizes that the guy that raped these women has sent him this tape showing him how they got into the house and attacked the unknowing victim.

Brad fast—forwards for a few seconds and there’s another image. This image is incredibly decipherable. It is the front of his home. The porch lights on. And the camera view starts to move toward the house. Brad gets goose bumps as he watches someone video taping himself walking toward his house at night.

              The camera turns off and then there’s light again. Currently the image is that of someone walking through the exact room he’s sitting in right at this moment, his living room. It’s dark except for the light on in the kitchen. The camera at this time shows the door to his son’s room and he begins to shake a little. The door is pushed open and the camera pans his room. The camera now goes into what appears to be night vision mode because everything turns green and white. The person videotaping has moved the camera to Brad Junior’s bed. And he’s in it. They pan his face with a close up and they go through out the room. It stops on his desk and subsequently on his wall with awards and trophy’s. Brad takes a furious and deep breath as he watches this frightening image of someone walking through his sleeping son’s room.

Brad grits his teeth and fast forwards. There’s no sound and finally the images are gone. The person taping this purposely left out how they obtained entrance into the house. At this time Brad is as mad as he is scared. This guy just showed Brad that even he’s not safe in his own home. He can get into his house and do whatever he wants. Brad takes the tape out and walks it into the kitchen and places it into his briefcase.

He walks into his son’s room. The shower is running and he looks around the room where this piece of shit scumbag was and he looks at the wall they shot in the video. He’s covered in chills knowing that the person they are dealing with will definitely have no problem killing his kid. Just as that thought enters his mind he glances over to Bradley’s desk and sees a picture of him and his son in a team picture of when he coached him when he was five years old in little league on his t-ball team. Brad places his hands over his face and takes a deep breath. He knows that he has to get Brad somewhere safe. And he has to do it fast.

Brad Jr. walks out of the bathroom in only his towel and says. “What was on the tape?”

Brad picks up a baseball off of his shelf and lies back on the bed and tosses it up in the air. “Just a bunch of shit about doing what he says type stuff, nothing to worry about.” He lies there playing catch with himself while Brad Jr. gets dressed. He keeps looking at his wall at the pictures of him and Bradley when he was little and thinks. ‘There is no way I will allow anyone to hurt my boy.’

                            The two Jostler men head out for the evening. Brad Sr. doesn’t mention anything about the tape. They go back to the station so Brad can get the pictures and the letter from his desk. Brad Jr. goes in with him and flirts a little with some of the lady officers. He takes his envelope and they decide to go talk to his friends and dads before they eat. Brad feels that his house might be bugged. Brad Jr. picked up on that when he was talking about going to his Uncle Bucks in Texas. The truth is his Uncle Buck lives in Nevada. Brad Jr. must inherit his dad’s detective mind because when they were in the house and the car neither one of them mentioned it again. That was until they were at the steak house when Brad Jr. said to his dad after the waitress walked away. “You must be really scared to think someone is bugging the house to say Uncle Buck lived in Texas.”

Brad just smiled and said to his son. “You are a smart kid to play along like that.” Then they had a great evening together. All of his friend’s dads agreed with Mr. Jostler. They are all a close-knit group of friends. All of the families have lived in the same neighborhood since the kids where born and the parents all play cards and bowl together. Brad doesn’t join them anymore since Nicole died but he still maintains contact. So when the parents read the letter and heard what Brad had to say about what was going on they all agreed 110%. They were scared. Mostly the moms but all of the dads know Brad’s brother Buck and they know their boys are all going to be in good safe hands.

CHAPTER 9

BRAD PLANS TO OUTSMART THE KILLER

The plan is being laid out in Brad’s head. He wants to assure the safety of everyone around him. He’s almost hoping that the killer, for lack of a better name, has bugged his home. He’s been trying extremely hard to make it seem like his son and his friends are going to Texas instead of Nevada, at least in his open talk at home and in his personal vehicle. Brad is trying to play his own game of cat and mouse with the guy who’s trying to ruin his life as well as everyone else involved.

With proper arrangements in place Brad hopes that his idea will work. He wants to hear back from this murdering fiend as to what he might think he knows. A simple letter or message alerting Brad that he knows that he’s hiding out the kids in Texas would let him know that his plan has worked.                                          

At that time only will he be able to move onward and upward with his investigation. Not being sure just how advanced this guy might be with surveillance, he’s been working on his plan in the open, at parks and restaurants to put the plan in motion with the other parents to avoid the possibility of being listened in on.

                            The plan he has goes like this. His first priority is the safeties of his son and his friends, then of course the female officers. Todd Avery’s not concerned due to the fact that he hopes to come into contact with this guy to give him a taste of his kind of justice. As far as Darrin, he thinks he has the perfect solution. Instead of having him think that Brad doesn’t feel he’s capable to taking care of himself, Brad has him convinced that he would be doing him a better service if he would be with the kids in Nevada to be able to keep an eye on them and help protect the kids from potential danger.

     Tammy, Dorothy and Betty have decided to stay on to help in anyway possible. They are taking more precautions to be safe at the request of Brad. The chief and the rest of the force are being extremely cooperative with Brad and his plan. Especially after they watched the tape and read the letter the safety of the kids is the precincts top priority.

Phase two is to take the kids and Darrin to a private airport and have the guys flown on a Chicago PD private jet to Nevada. This would eliminate the possibility of this person being able to possibly trace the origin of the flight or its destination. The order at the precinct is to never talk about the plan out loud. It has been stressed as to the importance of complete silence on the matter.

              Then, only after he has some kind of conformation that the guy who is raping and killing believes that the kids are in Texas will Brad continue with his investigation?

     Knowing that this will put him in danger the top brass has taken the liberty of having the Chicago PD’s technical division at his house disguised in a plumbing van wiring his house for security. The team of surveillance experts has also done the same at Betty’s, Dorothy's and Todd’s, as well as Tammy’s as a special favor to Brad. Each time disguised as different professions as well as different officers. Brad hopes that this will throw off the guy who seems too able to make his entry any time and anywhere he chooses. He’s covering all bases and leaving very little to chance.

     Brad refuses to let anyone control the way he does his job. He will find this guy. And now the investigation is not just business as usual. This guy has threatened his son, now it’s personal.

The plan has been set in motion. All i’s are being dotted and t’s being crossed. Brad feels that this will work. It’s taken a few days and dozen of man—hours to make this happen. Brad prays that this will pay off in the end.

The precinct has the top of the line in security as would be expected at one of the largest precincts in one of the largest cities in the world. Communication with the kids and Officer Darrin Turner has been set up to be done with a special hard line that is impossible to tap or trace.

The chief has this task of communication being handled by someone he has total faith in, his nephew. He’s a 3-year veteran of the Chicago police department and the chief has him in place to handle this obvious important task along with his regular duties.

It’s a very sensitive area when dealing with the safety of a fellow officer’s child, or any child for that matter. There are only a few select people who are totally aware of all the details of what’s going on,
very few. This is a crucial area and the least amount of people who know the less the chance of there being a potential leak. No one in the media has a clue.

Brad returns to the office after a three-day hiatus that actually included more work then he’d do in 5 days at the office. This work is important and it had to be done to make sure they could continue with the investigation keeping several people safe and out of harms way. The whole case has taken on a different perspective at this point in time. It’s become a sort of vendetta with many of the officers. One thing that’s a silent rule in police work is never mess with family,
ever
. And that’s what this creep has done. It goes without saying but the small handful of officers who know about the threats against Brad’s kid feel that now they have no choice but to bring this low—life to justice. And hopefully it’s not Todd or Brad that bring him in. Because if it is one of them. The poor bastard might not make it to a trial, just straight to the morgue.

BRAD GOES BACK TO BUSINESS AS USUAL

Brad walks out of the office of Chief Jason
Carlin’s nephew with a big grin on his face. The calls were made and everything’s fine in Nevada. The boys are fine and they’re having a good time, as well as can be expected at least under the circumstances. Brad plans on placing a call every day to check on them and makes stops on his way home every night to update the other parents in person.

Every call and every letter coming into the office of Brad Jester is closely monitored. He feels a gigantic sense of relief knowing his son and the other boys are safe now. Total relief won’t be there until after he’s sure the bad guy is fooled.

Brad walks to his office and smiles at Tammy as he passes her office. She smiles back and says. “Todd and Betty are due back this afternoon. Are you going to be here?”

“I sure am. Why do you ask?” Brad inquires as he walks into her office and takes a piece of hard candy from her bowl. Brad still feels the occasional craving for a smoke so he sucks on hard candy whenever possible. 

“Well I was just wondering if you would like to go to lunch with me, my treat.” Tammy sits down acting shy moving papers around.

“I’d have to say no…” Tammy frowns. Then Brad smiles and says. “I would love to go to lunch with you. But it’s my treat. Is that ok?” Tammy smiles.

“If you insist, so I’ll meet you in your office about, let’s say 12:15.” She sits up straight and smiles showing off her adorable dimples.

“Make it a quarter after instead.” Brad takes another piece of candy and winks as
he leaves her office. Brad is able to joke around now. He's at ease knowing his son is safe.