The Axeman's Jazz (Skip Langdon Mystery Series #2) (The Skip Langdon Series) (34 page)

“Yeah.” He looked very serious, a little boy sent to the principal’s office. “I think she came to a meeting once. She spoke to me. I think she’s the one.”

“What did she say?”

“Missy and I weren’t sitting together. She came over after the meeting and asked if I’d like to have coffee—just came out and said it. Said she’d seen me across the room and thought she’d like to meet me. I was real embarrassed. I said I had to go home and study. I didn’t even tell her Di and everybody would probably go to PJ’s. I just sort of stammered. I got a real bad feeling when I saw her picture in the paper. Like after I turned her down maybe she asked someone else.” He paused a moment and tried to grin. “Is that what they mean by codependent? When you feel responsible for something like that?”

But Skip was more interested in something else—Linda Lee had been drinking coffee. “You mean you suspected someone else from the group?”

“The group? No. I just thought if she was in the habit of doing that … some guy got her.”

“Did you see her ask anyone else?”

“No. I got out of there fast. Missy had her own car, so I didn’t have to wait.”

“Can you remember when it was?”

“Oh, yeah. It was the Thursday before I saw her picture in the paper. That’s why I was so freaked.”

“Why didn’t you call the police?” She tried to keep the anger out of her voice.

“Well, I wasn’t sure it was her. And you know; I didn’t want to get involved.”

“Do you know a Jerilyn Jordan?”

“No. Why?”

“She was murdered tonight.”

He sat back and blinked at her, fighting the words off. Finally, he said, “I don’t understand. What does it have to do with me?”

“She’s Abe’s baby-sitter.”

“Abe?” Skip wondered what kind of doctor he’d make. His mind seemed fuzzy, he couldn’t seem to wake up.

She decided she liked that. He was vulnerable. She made a decision; nodded as if she possessed superior wisdom.

“Yes, Abe. The man who shared about having to get a baby-sitter.”

“Oh, yeah, I remember that. I know the guy. We had a meeting at his house once.”

“Do you understand what this means?”

But he just sat there, looking more and more depressed, lips tight, eyes strained.

“Everyone at the meeting knew she was there. And I guess most regulars knew Abe usually went and had coffee afterward.”

“Oh.”

She said, “Three people have been killed, Sonny, and all of them are linked to that inner-child group. And now you tell me the group’s actually been to Abe’s house.”

“So you think the Axeman’s someone in the group?”

“Do you?”

“Missy! I’ve got to call Missy!” He shot out of his seat, dumping the puppy with a thunk, but Skip grabbed his wrist. If he got to Missy before she did, she’d lose the element of surprise.

“I’m going to see her right now. I’ll have her call you.” He sat down again, legs rubbery, not seeming to have much will of his own.

Skip was starting to think there was more to this than grogginess; he seemed a very depressed young man. But who wasn’t, especially in this bunch? They didn’t go to twelve-step programs because they were the picture of emotional health. Still, Sonny looked more like it than most.

He said, “She’s going through a rough time—all that incest stuff.” He shuddered. “Can you imagine? Your own father! What kind of father would do a thing like that?”

“How was she tonight? When you took her home?”

“A little shaky. Not too good, to tell you the truth. You know why?”

I can guess
.

“She was worried about me.”

Bingo.

“Because of what Di said about her doctor. He’s my dad. I was really embarrassed when Di said it. For my dad, you know? But of course nobody but Missy knew who it was. Not even Di. I know her last name because—” He stopped, looking confused, but in a moment he brightened. “I saw it the night of the Axeman party. On her mailbox. But nobody knows my name. I never use it in there. Anyway, first I was embarrassed and then I was mad. I knew how it was going to affect Missy. I knew she’d be really worried about me.” He leaned down, stroked the dog for comfort. “The girl wasn’t raped, was she?”

Skip was so taken aback by the change of subject, she almost asked, “What girl?”

“We don’t know yet,” she said.

“Poor Missy,” said Sonny, as if she were the victim.

Missy’s living room light was on and so was the porch one, ready for a visitor. Realizing Sonny had called her after all, Skip cursed herself for telling him about the Axeman. But at least it saved endless explanations and the tedious footwork of dodging questions.

Missy did an odd thing. As soon as she saw Skip, she let held-back tears come to her eyes and threw her arms around her, clung to her like a child needing a big sister. “Oh, Skip, I’m so glad you’re here. Sonny’s coming, but he said you’d want to see me first.”

She looked about fifteen in her Lanz summer robe. “I’m so glad to have a friend in the police department.”

She was so winning, this girl. Who wouldn’t like her? And yet Skip knew that deep down Missy felt no one did, that she worked so hard at being liked to hide her imagined worthlessness. Skip had her problems with her own father, but for now she was just grateful she’d been spared Missy’s ordeal.

“Sonny’s told you what happened tonight?”

“Yes. And everything else—about the Axeman being someone in the group.”

“I didn’t say that…”

“But he thought you thought that.”

Well, he’s right
. “We don’t have a suspect yet.”

“It’s so creepy.”

“It is. It’s horrible to think someone you know might be a murderer. Listen, Missy, I hate to do this, but I have to ask you what you did tonight after you left PJ’s.”

She shrugged. “Sonny brought me right home. That was all.”

“Do you live alone?”

“I live with my aunt, but she left for Thailand this morning. That’s why Sonny’s so freaked out—because I’m all alone here. Oh, Skip, I’m so worried about him. And of course he’s worried about me. But he’s working through something really painful. Something he won’t talk about.”

“Is it something to do with the new puppy?”

She smiled. “Isn’t he cute? I got him for him. I thought it might help because he’s so sad about this grandfather stuff. It only started coming up the last few days. It’s something about his whole family. I think he thinks they blame him for his grandfather’s death.”

“That’s nothing. Knowing Sonny, he probably blames himself.”
The same way he thinks it’s his fault Linda Lee got killed because he didn’t have coffee with her.

“Isn’t that the truth? That’s just what he’s like. Maybe that’s why he’s more like that than most people. Because of his grandfather, I mean.”

“I guess most little kids blame themselves when there’s a death in the family.”

“But Sonny’s an extreme case. It’s why he decided to become a doctor. He didn’t do it because his father and grandfather were doctors. It’s because he’s still suffering guilt about someone dying that he couldn’t save.” She turned mournful blue eyes on Skip. “It’s so sad, isn’t it?”

Skip tried to smile. Enough of this. “He’s worried about you too, kid.”

Afterward, she went back to the office, but Cappello sent her home. Sent herself home as well, calling a task-force meeting at eight: “Last thing I want on my hands is a bunch of ornery cops who’ve been up all night.”

Skip got two hours’ sleep, but it was better than nothing.

By eight-thirty, they’d identified everyone at the meeting except two people and eliminated twenty-seven as suspects.

There were fifteen people who hadn’t yet been interviewed or who had no alibis, among them Skip’s four and the two they hadn’t yet identified. All of them were possible suspects.

Of the thirteen who had been identified, four had criminal records, including Di and Alex. They decided to concentrate on these four, assigning full-time surveillance to all of them. Skip got Di.

O’Rourke was assigned to go over the phone list with various witnesses, and then to go over the many lists and diagrams composed over the past few hours by the task force—lists of people who’d been at the meeting, diagrams of the meeting room, each chair bearing the name of its occupant. This way they hoped to identify the last two attendees and verify the others.

Out of the muck and mire had arisen several people who’d known Tom Mabus, one or two who could vaguely remember Linda Lee. And that was about it. Except for two things. One was the niggling feeling that, because of the scarf, this wasn’t an Axeman murder after all. Maybe it was a copycat. The other was Cindy Lou’s salty assessment of a few people she’d met the night before.

“That Di’s a piece of work, man.”

“I love it,” said Abasolo, “when you throw around those scientific terms.”

“She’s got to have every man she can get, but my guess is she doesn’t give them much in return. She’s so far in denial about most things, she sounds like she’s crazy half the time, but I don’t think so.”

“So she couldn’t be the Axeman?”

“Sure she could. Good combination of organized and disorganized characteristics. But personally I like Abe, just because he’s the biggest creep of all. Don’t you love the way everything’s always everybody else’s fault?”

O’Rourke asked, “What does that have to do with anything?”

“Murderers justify their acts. That’s easy to do if everybody else is in the wrong. Now Alex. He’s a kind of a mirror image of Di. She’s got to have men, he’s got to have women. He’s emotionally about five years old, and anybody here who has kids knows I’m talking seriously dangerous. I’m tempted to say his attention span’s probably too short to kill three people, but you never know—I once saw the damage after a five-year-old took a whole house apart.

“Sonny’s so screwed up he’s not even going to figure out how bad it is till he’s forty-five or fifty, and by then he’ll probably be a drunk. Killers don’t usually look quite so nicey-nice, but trust me—there’s some real turbulence under that bland facade. Skip’s told me about her interview with his brother—he had an early family life consistent with a killer’s, but so did nearly all of them.

“Missy, for instance. History of abuse. On the surface she looks like a victim rather than a criminal, but you know how much rage you’d have if you’d been through what she has?”

“Is that fair?” said Cappello. “The average incest survivor isn’t a killer.”

“The average person who fits any of the profiles may not be a killer. A killer identifies with the aggressor and—oh, hell, who knows what turns them? That’s what we don’t know. Why two people can have parallel experiences and one’s a serial murderer, the other’s a psychologist.”

“What,” said O’Rourke, “are you getting at?”

“I’m just making a few observations, that’s all. Just noticing that everybody who shared last night looks normal, looks good if you just know them casually, meet them on the street or something. Interview them in the course of an investigation. But every one of ’em’s crazy as a bedbug.”

“Oh, come on,” said Hodges. “I saw ’em too, you know. We all did. They’re no crazier than anybody else.”

“I didn’t say they were.”

SINCE DI LIVED near Skip, she figured she might as well have breakfast at home. And besides, she had some unfinished business with Steve.

He was dressed and making coffee. “Hi, gorgeous. Catch him yet?”

“Don’t gorgeous me. You’re not just a witness anymore. You’re an alibi.”

“Whose?” He handed her a full mug.

“Don’t pretend you don’t even know.”

“Well, I could sure take a guess. One of your suspects did happen to say she was really enjoying talking to me and even invited me home for a cup of herb tea. And I did happen to go.”

“You didn’t mention that last night.”

“I just didn’t get to it, that’s all. I said I walked Di to her car. I didn’t say what I did then.”

“How long did you stay?”

“Twenty minutes max. I don’t even know why I went except for maybe some crazy idea about getting closer to the whole scene. Anyway, it was coltsfoot tea or some damn thing that tasted like poison, and I found I couldn’t hack more than fifty or sixty preposterous misstatements to the quarter-hour. I thought I was tough, but forget it. I’ve got a new respect for you girls in blue.

“I would say ‘women in blue,’ but you’d say if you’ve got ‘boys in blue,’ why not ‘girls,’ and the whole thing would just get stupid and predictable.”

But Steve was warming up to full-tilt rant and couldn’t be stopped: “What planet is that woman from? I didn’t come all the way here from California just to meet someone dippier than my next-door neighbor, Rainbow Circle Melamed-Gutierrez, who is not, no matter what you’re thinking, the unfortunate offspring of two unacquainted burnouts who got it on at Altamont and never saw each other again, but a plump, cheerful fifty-five-year-old with hair three feet out on all sides, talons from acrylic heaven, four inches of makeup, and crystals down to her knees. She’s a ‘personal effectiveness coach’ who never eats anything with eyes and also happens to channel the entity Michael. Do you know what she told me?”

“Rainbow?”

“No, Di. I complimented her driving and she said she was a race car driver in another life. So I mentioned that if she was, her career must have gone up in flames, so to speak, since she’d have to have died about the time cars were invented in order to have time to get reincarnated and live to whatever age she is now. You know what she said to that?”

“Something about linear time and real time, I bet.”

“You got it. She could be a race car driver right now, as a matter of fact, and probably is. It’s just in a parallel universe.” He shook his head like a wet dog. “So how long does she say I stayed?”

“She was having so much fun she lost track of time.”

“If she really meant to go out and murder that girl, why didn’t she just go do it? She saw Abe staying with Nini, she knew the coast was clear then—why ask me over for tea?”

“How do I know? Maybe coltsfoot tea makes her homicidal. Maybe she only kills when she’s sexually frustrated. Cindy Lou’s the motive expert, not me.”