The 9th Girl (39 page)

“That guy,” he said, freezing the frame and tapping the screen. “I think it’s the same guy. Don’t you think it’s the same guy?”

Liska shrugged, looking from one screen to the other. The images were distant and blurry. “Maybe. I don’t know. They’re both short and have beards and parkas.”

“They’re both short and have beards and parkas, and they’re in Holiday stations with girls who went missing,” he said.

“Doc Holiday trolling the Holiday stations?” Tippen said. “His idea of a joke?”

“Dana Nolan picked the store,” Kovac said. “If our bad guy was stalking her, then he just followed her there. But I’m sure the irony wasn’t lost on him.”

“I don’t know, Sam,” Liska said. “If Doc Holiday took Penny Gray, she was a victim of opportunity, like all his other victims. He had to just happen to be there when she was. But the girl had other people in her life who might have wanted her dead. What are the odds she got nabbed by a serial killer?”

“What are the odds anyway?” Kovac challenged. “And just because people in your personal life hate you doesn’t mean you can’t become a victim of a random crime.

“That’s not even my point,” he said. “I looked at this first tape this morning and I thought I should know the guy, but I couldn’t put my finger on why. Then I see him on the footage of Dana Nolan.”

Liska shook her head. “I’m not convinced it’s the same guy.”

Kovac ignored her protest. “Think back. A year ago.”

“Oh my God,” she groaned. “I can’t remember last night!”

“Stop being a wiseass,” he snapped, irritated no one else seemed to be catching on. “Think back a year ago to Rose Reiser.”

“Rose . . . ?”

He watched his partner’s face as she processed the thoughts and dug up the memory. He saw the second the seed took hold.

“Oh my God,” she murmured. She took the remotes away from him and pointed them at the televisions like a pair of laser guns. She backed the tapes up and played them simultaneously.

“It can’t be that guy,” she said. “We checked him out six ways to Sunday.”

“What guy?” Elwood asked.

“The guy that reported finding Rose Reiser’s body last year,” she said. “New Year’s Doe was called in by a guy driving a box truck full of antiques and junk. But he was completely cooperative. He didn’t even complain when we went through his truck with a fine-toothed comb.”

“Frank Fitzgerald,” Kovac said. “He’s from Iowa.”

“Drives a box truck,” Tippen said. “Travels as part of his business.”

“But we checked him out,” Liska insisted. “There was nothing. Zip. Nada.”

“But there he is,” Kovac said, pointing at the screen.

“Or a guy who looks vaguely like him,” she argued. “As a single woman, I hate to say it, but there are a lot more guys running around looking like that guy than any Hollywood heartthrob.”

“Well, I don’t like it,” Kovac said stubbornly. “That’s three too many coincidences.”

“You think a serial killer would just happily hand over his vehicle to crime scene investigators?” Liska asked.

“If he knew he’d cleaned it up well enough.”

“Those are some cojones.”

“Yeah, Tinks,” Tippen said. “You might want to reconsider lowering your standards on the rest of the package if the guy has a set like that.”

Liska rolled her eyes. “That’s just wishful thinking on your part.”

“Frank Fitzgerald. I talked to that guy on the phone yesterday,” Elwood said, bringing them back on point. “His name was on the call list for reviewing the old cases. He was sorry to hear we had a new one.”

“Where was he?” Liska asked.

“Iowa number.”

“Doesn’t mean he’s in Iowa,” Kovac said.

“Doesn’t mean he’s not,” Liska returned. She glanced up at the television sets, her eyes going wide. “What the fuck?!”

She grabbed the remote and hit Pause, freezing the frame on Aaron Fogelman walking away from the counter at the Holiday station near the Rock & Bowl the night of Penny Gray’s disappearance. Kovac could feel her shock and braced himself for what would follow it. She turned and punched him hard on the arm.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” she asked, glaring at him. “You watched this all the way through, and you didn’t mention this to me?”

“I just watched it this far through this morning. This is like ten minutes after the Gray girl leaves the store.”

“And gets in the trunk of that sociopath’s car! Goddamnit, Kojak! How could you not bring this to my attention?”

“You know, I got a little distracted by a kidnapping,” he said. “Do you think this kid was up at three in the morning snatching Dana Nolan off the street?”

“Don’t be stupid!”

“I’ve got the other guy in two videos related to two victims, and reporting the dead body of a victim a year ago,” Kovac said.

“You’ve got a hunch based on a vague resemblance, and you want to bet it like a trifecta at the racetrack!” Liska argued. “Are you out of your freaking mind?

“Aaron Fogelman hit Penny Gray not twenty minutes before this video,” she said. “He
punched
her. The kid has a violent temper. He’s a liar. Here he is in this store within minutes of our victim. And you’re going off about some poor schmuck from Iowa who probably isn’t even in the state? Have you gone senile?”

“I’m not saying we exclude the Fogelman kid as a person of interest on the Gray homicide,” Kovac said. “I’m saying there’s a bigger possibility here.”

“Well, say it to someone else,” Liska said, getting up to move away from him. “We’ve got people in Penny Gray’s life who are lying out their asses every time they open their mouths, and that kid is one of them,” she said, pointing to the screen. “For Christ’s sake, the girl’s own mother just lawyered up. I’ve already got a call in to Aaron Fogelman’s father. I’m betting he does the same. I know where my focus is staying.”

Kovac spread his hands in surrender. “That’s fine,” he said. “Stay on it. I hope you’re right, Tinks. Because if you’re not, we’ve got a bigger monster on our hands than I want to think about.”

41

On the upside of
kidnapping a news reporter was the fact that he didn’t have to wonder about the investigation. There were no long lapses in coverage of the case, particularly on the station she worked for.

Fitz kept the TV tuned in for all the breaking news—of which there was none, of course. They kept showing the parking lot of Dana Nolan’s apartment building, blocked off with fluttering ribbons of yellow crime scene tape and crawling with cops and crime scene investigators swarming around her car like ants on a scrap of food.

He recognized Kovac moving around the scene with his hands jammed in his pockets and his shoulders hunched against the wind. There was no sign of his partner, Liska. That was a bit of a disappointment.

The
NewsWatch
people kept putting up photographs of their missing news girl and making pleas for information. The level of desperation was very high. He liked that. The adrenaline rush he got from hearing that was something new and intoxicating and probably addicting. He had always been happy with his way of doing things. The balance of risk to reward he maintained had always been just right for him. But this, he admitted, was heady stuff. He had to be careful not to get drunk on it and make a mistake. He had to keep his objective in mind.

He had a point to make.

He couldn’t get too excited that the homicide captain, Kasselmann, made a personal appearance not only at the official press conference but in the studio on the
NewsWatch
set, to say the police department was taking very seriously the idea that they were dealing with a very dangerous predator in Doc Holiday. Giving credit where credit was due.

That was all he really wanted at the heart of it, he thought with a smile as he turned to his latest victim, who was still alive and crying, waiting for him to kill her. He was an artist, and he wanted recognition for his work.

He chose a knife with a fine sharp point and leaned over the terrified girl. She was naked, tied down spread-eagle to the work table. He had removed the duct tape from her mouth and replaced it with a red ball gag. He could smell her fear. The scent was an aphrodisiac like no other. Her eyes widened with panic as he touched the tip of the blade to the center of her chest. Blood bloomed rose red against her pale white skin.

“And you, my love,” he said as the excitement stirred within him, “will be my masterpiece.”

42

“The address on his
DL is one of those mailbox places,” Kovac said, pouring another cup of coffee. He figured he had to be on his second gallon of the day. Dinner was pizza someone had left over from lunch. Dessert would be a handful of whatever antacids he could find in his desk drawer. Tinks had gone home to feed her kids. He wished he was one of them.

“We’ve got a phone number, right?” Kasselmann said, taking a seat at the table, which was littered with paperwork and file folders, coffee cups and food wrappers. He cast a dubious glance at the lone remaining piece of pizza drying out like a piece of roadkill on the abandoned greasy cardboard box. He had spent most of his day dealing with the media. The knot in his tie was still square. His only concession to exhaustion was the removal of his suit jacket.

In contrast, Kovac knew he looked like he had crawled out of bed after sleeping off a three-day bender in his clothes. He needed a shave. He needed a shower. He needed a good night’s sleep and a long vacation on a beach someplace where no one had ever heard the words
windchill factor.
He had spent the day either freezing his ass off outdoors or sweating like a horse in this room.

“Elwood spoke to him yesterday. He said the guy was cordial and sympathetic and wished he could do something to help,” Kovac said. “I called the number this afternoon and left a message requesting a callback. I haven’t heard anything.”

“We need his phone records,” Kasselmann said. “Find out where that phone is pinging.”

“I’ve got no cause for a warrant.” He shrugged. “I talked my way into getting as much as the address. He’s got no wants or warrants. I’ve got nothing but some iffy surveillance video. Tinks isn’t convinced it’s him on the tape. I can’t swear to it, but I’ve got that feeling in my gut.”

“I wouldn’t bet against that,” Kasselmann said. “You’ve got good instincts, Sam.”

“Right now, that and a dollar will buy you jack shit,” he said. “’Cause other than my hunch we’ve got nothing to go on here. No witnesses. No fingerprints. No suspects. No leads.”

He walked to the wall where he had taped a copy of the missing persons flier with the photo of Penny Gray and the signature of a killer.

HAPPY HOLIDAY

Smug bastard.

“This guy is sitting out there somewhere laughing and giving us the finger,” he said.

“We’d better hope that’s all he’s doing,” Kasselmann said, getting to his feet.

Kovac said nothing, but he couldn’t help but recall what John Quinn had said that morning. Doc Holiday had taken Dana Nolan for the primary purpose of killing her. He had had her in his control now for seventeen hours.

And there wasn’t a damn thing Sam could do about it.

•   •   •

“
H
E THREW THE FIRST PUNCH
, M
OM
.”

“I know,” Nikki said, glancing at her son.

He sat at the kitchen island with an ice pack wrapped around his right hand. He looked like less of a little boy to her tonight, more of a young man. Today she had seen him stand up to a bully and protect a young lady. He was growing up. She couldn’t decide if she was sad or proud or scared to death. All of the above, she supposed.

It had been so difficult to stay in the car as she had pulled up to the scene of the fight. But she had stayed put and let Elwood step in, knowing she would only have embarrassed Kyle and given his enemies future ammunition to use against him.

“Are you going to want more of this?” she asked, as she replaced the aluminum foil over the pan of lasagna. She had stopped at their favorite Italian restaurant on her way home and picked up dinner. It wasn’t homemade, but it was better than nothing.

She hated the thought that the best she could do these days for her sons was “better than nothing.”

“Maybe,” he said. “Probably.”

She slid the pan back into the oven and left the temperature on the lowest setting. “Don’t let me forget this and burn the house to the ground.”

“Okay.”

R.J. came into the kitchen to refill his glass with milk. “Can I have a brownie?”

“Yes.”

“Can I watch TV?”

“Is your homework done?”

He nodded, digging a brownie out of the pan Marysue had brought over.
Better than nothing
 . . .

“Can we get a dog?”

“No. Thought you would just slip that one by me, did you?” Nikki said.

He made a goofy face. “Can’t blame a guy for trying.”

Nikki shook her head, glad for the comic relief. But as soon as her youngest had left the room, her mind went back to the matter at hand.

“What’s the story with the Fogelman kid?” she asked. “Has he always been a problem for you?”