The Caller (15 page)

‘Come with me. Open your closet.’ He gestured towards the bedroom and pressed his face close to David’s. ‘Show me the space under your bed. What do you hide there? What toys do you take out to play with in the dark when no-one’s around?’

‘Jesus Christ,’ said David. ‘This is what you do to people? Humiliate them. I don’t know where you’re going with this but—’ David released a breath. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘I don’t care.’

‘Please. Try me.’

‘Why?’

‘I could help you this time.’

‘Believe me. You
are
helping me. You helped
me into your home. You helped me into your soul.’

He raised his head and stared at the ceiling. ‘You helped me affirm my beliefs. You helped me, David. You can take that with you.’ He wiped a hand down the black fabric of the mask. ‘And you will go on helping me.’

Joe and Danny walked in through the open door of the apartment building. There was no doorman at the desk.

‘Hello?’ said Joe.

‘These people pay all this money to feel safe in their apartments and this guy just goes out, takes a walk,’ said Danny. ‘Come on.’

David lay on his back on the hardwood floor, his head inches from the front door. The Caller was on top of him, pinning him down, his knees on either side of his chest.

‘If you remain silent through this, trust me that I will stop at a point,’ said The Caller. ‘And you will survive.’

The sudden urgent siren of a fire truck made David turn his head towards the window. The glass shone with silent rain and reflected lights. Nine floors down, people walked the wet pavement. Cars drove past. And no-one knew what was happening inside his apartment.

* * *

Joe and Danny took the elevator to the ninth floor and rang the doorbell. There was no answer. Danny rang again. Still no answer.

‘Do you have his number?’ said Danny.

‘Yeah,’ said Joe, scrolling through his phone. He dialled and waited. ‘Nothing.’

‘Let’s go eat, come back in a little while,’ said Danny. ‘He could be at the gym or something.’

The chime of the doorbell seemed a distant memory as David Burig felt the metal of the gun barrel pressed hard into his eye socket. It pushed his head back against the floor, his chin high in the air. And then it was gone. Instead, he watched the swift descent of a hammer towards his face. A surge of strength rushed through him, his body still wired to fight attack in whatever small, useless way. He closed his eyes. He lifted his head a fraction from the ground, pitching it frantically from side to side, crazed and desperate thrashing. At his temples, veins bulged. His jaw clamped shut. Every muscle in his face and neck strained. His legs bucked, the only part of him free, but not free. His bare feet scrambled for grip on the floor, their damp heat stopping them, sticking them to the varnished floorboards, burning up his heels. Laid open, bare, exposed, bucking and writhing for his life. He waited, still rolling his head from side to side, dizzy and sick with the movement. For a tired second, he stopped. His breath exploded
outwards, saliva spraying into the air. Seconds followed in the quiet, eerie expectation of pain.

Nothing happened. Then he could feel it. Slowly at first. Muscular thighs on either side of his ribcage. Squeezing. The pounding in his head was dull and steady. His eyes still closed, his breathing faltered, shaken by the first sensations of constriction. He took the pressure off his neck, resting his head back on the floor, his entire focus switched to his lungs. He imagined them filled with air, maximum expansion, charging his body with oxygen, rushing it to his cells, keeping him here. He coughed, choking against the constriction.

Crushing tighter against his chest, the muscles in The Caller’s legs began to tremble, then shake violently, each spasm and rise in temperature transferred to the body beneath him. He rose briefly on his knees and the air flared with ammonia and spices, a stale steam-room smell.

David could feel the moisture on his chest. A thin stream of sweat rolled down it. His head was light, tingling all over. His scalp was cold and damp. Just as his breath was leaving him, the pressure was released. His mouth shot open, followed by his eyes, faulty reflexes; the exact position The Caller wanted him to be in as the hammer crashed down on his teeth.

The blows came over and over, splitting, breaking and cracking, splintering and shattering bones, flesh, teeth. The sounds the hammer made,
through the air, against his face, caught in torn flesh, were like another wound in the silence. He was secure in his achievement; David had created a vacuum where he stored up every scream that wanted to rip up his throat and take on the pain. Then it stopped. Tears streamed down his face, sobs choked in his throat, his stomach heaved. His whole body shook. He slowly opened his eyes, smearing the droplets of blood caught in his eyelashes.

The Caller reached across for his bag and took out two dental impression trays. He placed them on the floor beside him. He filled the top tray with a thick blue liquid.

‘Open wide,’ he said. David’s mouth shook. The Caller paused. ‘Stop.’

David nodded, closed his eyes and opened his mouth. The Caller slipped in the tray and pressed it hard against the bloodied roof of David’s mouth, coating every surface and filling every space with the cool silicone. A chill seeped into his damaged bones, shooting pain through his head.

‘Four minutes to set,’ said The Caller.

David’s eyes shot wide. He started to swallow uncontrollably. The Caller bent low, staring into his eyes, trying to force calm into him. He stayed that way, then grabbed the tray and pulled it free, pausing to look into it before he laid it beside him. He wiped David’s mouth with a folded paper towel.

‘Please,’ said David, spitting blood and saliva. ‘I have to look after my sister. You can’t—’

The Caller pretended to consider his plea. ‘OK, now the bottom teeth,’ he said. ‘Same again.’

David closed his eyes and tilted back his head. He wanted to hear another siren, louder than the first, one that was bringing police officers and battering rams to his door. He was restrained well, tightly bound, his wrists and hands now numb. And the blows started again, hard, fast and brutal.

David slowly opened his eyes and through the blood leaking into them, he caught flashes of The Caller and how – from somewhere closed and locked inside him, unleashed only now – he raged. As The Caller’s thighs locked on, unyielding, his upper body rocked from side to side, the hammer – a relentless onslaught of strikes. Without slowing, The Caller’s free hand tore at his mask, wrenching it over his head, throwing it to the ground. His face, flooded with anger, his eyes, closed and sucked into their sockets, his jaw moving, his mouth wide, his lips forming every word he wanted to roar. But no sound escaped. The message was silence.

All David could do now was take himself away. His spacious hallway became the smallest place he had ever been, but also as high and wide and deep as his greatest fear.

‘Jesus Christ,’ said Rufo. He stood with his hands linked at the back of his head, staring out David Burig’s window. His back was to the battered body by the door. ‘What the hell is going on?’

‘The guy was here, we were right outside,’ said Joe. ‘I can’t believe it.’

‘How were you to know?’ said Rufo. ‘How were you to know?’

‘But—’

‘But nothing,’ said Rufo. ‘We’ve just got to catch him. We just got to do everything we can to make sure Burig is the last.’

‘It’s Ethan Lowry all over again … without the phone,’ said Joe.

‘Mary Burig hadn’t made a call either,’ said Danny. ‘Cullen just said.’

‘Last call he got was from the lobby,’ said Martinez, walking over. ‘He asked the doorman to run to the deli for something. Burig and him
got on well. Anyway, doorman figured he was safe with a “detective” in the building.’

‘That’ll be the last favor he’ll do anyone,’ said Joe.

‘What do you say Henry is finally getting laid these days?’ said Martinez, pointing to a small, focused crime scene tech dusting the kitchen doorknob.

‘I have no idea who Henry is or what his sex life is like,’ said Joe, his voice tight.

‘I mean as a direct result of CSI?’ said Martinez. ‘Chicks dig him, they think his job is so glamorous.’

‘Yeah,’ said Joe. ‘Meanwhile, he’s here like a retard saying, “why do you need that printed?” “Why do you want a photo of that?” Because the killer might have touched it, you fucking douche-bag.’

‘Yeah, I’d love to have one of those TV CSI techs at all my scenes,’ said Bobby.

‘Yeah and they’d go interview all the witnesses too,’ said Danny.

‘And they’d work through all the evidence in a nice shiny lab,’ said Martinez.

‘And they’d solve the case,’ said Danny. ‘And they would be hot.’

‘Come on,’ said Joe. ‘It’s three o’clock. We’ve done all we can here.’

His cell phone rang.

‘Detective Lucchesi?

‘Yeah.’

‘Detective Scott Dolan here from Philadelphia PD. I know it’s late – I was going to leave a message. We received your request for information on any dentists that had been in trouble, etc. Now, it’s not dentists as such, but does the name Trahorne Refining mean anything to you?’

‘No.’

‘They’re a company that have a lot of dealings with dental laboratories – not directly with dentists. I don’t know too much about it myself. It’s just that we got a visit from a Curtis Walston a few weeks back, a local kid who had been fired by Trahorne after two weeks on the job. He was fairly unhappy about the whole situation. Anyway, he had no evidence, because he said it was all burned, but he claims he found several bloodstained items of clothing that had been sent into the company for incineration.’

‘I don’t get it.’

‘It’s kind of complicated. Trahorne’s business is about burning metals off of clothes and stuff that dental technicians use when they’re filing down the metal parts of crowns or false teeth. Anyway, we followed up with the owner, Bob Trahorne, who basically laughed in our faces. We had no evidence and what he was saying to us was “You’re taking the word of some punk over me?” There was nothing more we could do. But I just thought when I saw your report it might be of interest.
Curtis Walston is your classic disgruntled employee, but he came to us, so I don’t know. You might want to come up here and talk to him yourself.’

David Burig’s autopsy was six hours that could have been Ethan Lowry’s autopsy until Walter Dreux showed up. Walter was a forensic odontologist, part of the OCME’s Dental Identification Unit, called in for any cases that involved head injuries, decomposition, fires, bitemarks or unidentified victims.

‘Walter,’ said Danny. ‘Dentist to the dead.’

‘It’s on my business cards now,’ said Walter.

‘How you doing?’ said Joe.

‘Good. You guys?’

Joe shrugged. ‘So …’

‘Don’t come near me,’ said Walter, walking over to the body. He flashed a smile. ‘OK?’

‘You need to get over that,’ said Danny.

Walter had been burned on a major case because a homicide detective took notes as he was working and the attorney wouldn’t allow Walter to amend what he had said when he was finished. Walter’s day in court was not a happy one.

‘In a half hour, I’ll come out to you,’ he said. ‘Me and my lovely assistant here will do our thing, I will have a quiet moment and then I will give up the goods.’

He got to work and forty minutes later, came out to Danny, Joe and Dr Hyland.

‘I found a gift for you. Between the upper right second bicuspid and the first molar tooth.’

‘Spinach,’ said Danny.

‘More telling: a silicone-based dental impression material.’

‘What?’ said Joe.

‘Someone took an impression of this victim’s teeth,’ said Walter.

‘What? Just this victim?’ said Danny.

‘No, all the others too, I just didn’t want to bother you with it. I was waiting ‘til you were running out of leads or more bodies piled up – for dramatic effect.’

‘Relax,’ said Danny.

‘I’ll continue,’ said Walter. ‘Had the victim been to the dentist that day? That’d do it.’

‘No to the dentist theory – and we checked that out with all the victims.’

‘I can tell you the brand of material, but it won’t mean a lot because they’re so widely used. And no-one’s going to be dumb enough to use the latest one on the market, because you could narrow that down better. What I’m giving you here is the fact that the guy took an impression of this victim’s teeth.’

‘Why would anyone want to take an impression of his victims’ teeth?’ said Danny.

‘Why would anyone want to hammer the crap out of someone’s face?’ said Joe.

‘Because he can,’ said Danny.

‘You think the perp could have been a dentist?’ said Joe.

‘Nah,’ said Walter. ‘I’d say a cop.’

‘Ha-ha,’ said Danny.

‘It’s easy to do impressions of teeth,’ said Walter. ‘You don’t
have
to be a dentist. But I have to say, it makes sense.’

‘And you dentists are known for getting stressed out all the time,’ said Joe.

‘Yeah,’ said Walter, ‘going dental.’

‘Who uses impressions once they’re done?’ said Joe. ‘Like in the dentist’s office. Where does that go to after?’

‘A dental laboratory,’ said Walter.

Joe and Danny exchanged glances. ‘Holy shit,’ said Danny.

‘They make all the crowns, veneers, bridges,’ said Walter. ‘Some dentists use the same lab all the time. Others spread the love around. It’s whatever they want to do.’

‘Is there like a society for these guys?’ said Joe.

‘There’s formal training, college courses, you name it. But the industry is not regulated. You could set up in the morning.’

Curtis Walston was a gangsta rapper trapped in a skinny white boy’s body. He slouched diagonally across a bald brown sofa, his arm up over the back. Everything in his world was oversized – the baseball cap and shirt, the jeans, the watch, the bright
white sneakers, the widescreen TV, even the eyes in his pale, narrow face. Joe and Danny stood by the mantelpiece opposite him. Curtis spoke low, with his head bowed.

‘Screw Bob Trahorne, man. I took a job with him ’cos he runs a good lab, they give good returns. The only difference is where I worked before, we checked through the packages, drums, whatever that was sent in. We separated things out: the grindings, the solids, the sweeps. I get my ass fired ’cos I’s doing what I know.’

‘Curtis,’ said Danny. ‘That’s all a little technical for my friend, Detective Lucchesi here. He’s going to need you to explain what happens at Trahorne Refining, what goes down, how it all works.’

Curtis narrowed his eyes at Joe. ‘That’s cool.’ He shrugged. ‘What it is, is Trahorne supplies metal to dental technicians: gold, platinum, palladium, silver. Dental technicians work for dentists, making implants, bridges, crowns whatever. Dentists take an impression of the teeth, they send that to the dental technician who makes a model, so’s he can make the false teeth or veneers or whatever the perfect size.’

‘Tell us about the packages you get sent,’ said Joe.

‘When the dental technician is making the false teeth, the base is made of metal, then the porcelain is put on top. The metal’s been moulded in an oven, but when it comes out, it ain’t perfect, there’s bits of crud sticking out, some filing down
and smoothing to do. So they use this grinding and buffing wheel that spins real fast. Little bits of metal can get everywhere. Like what I said: “grindings”, which are sort of like shavings. “Solids” are little chunks of metal, pieces of foil. “Sweeps” is what the technician might wipe down off his desk or even shake out of his hair onto a piece of paper. The stuff gets everywhere. And this gold and shit costs money. So what the technician will do is get a big envelope and throw it all in: the piece of paper, the lab coat, a cloth he had over his lap, a scrap of carpet that might have been under his bench, a sweater he was wearing, whatever. Or maybe, he’ll throw it all in to one of them fifty-five gallon paper drums.

‘And send it to a place like Trahorne’s,’ said Joe.

‘Yeah. Instead of throwing away the leftover metal, he get paid for it.’

‘’Cos what Trahorne does is refining and assaying.’

Danny frowned as he listened. Curtis looked up at him.

‘Assaying means they work out how much metal is in the package and refining is about taking it all out, separating one metal from another or whatever. This way, there’s no waste. I get the package, take out the paperwork, then I put the package onto a tray, it goes in the incinerator at 2400 degrees and everything gets nuked. All you got’s left is the metal. We weigh it, then send the
lab a cheque for the amount or we pay them in coins, metal – whatever they want.’

‘This is a business that is run on trust,’ said Danny.

‘I guess so,’ said Curtis. ‘I mean, some dental techs weigh their package before they send it in on, like, bathroom scales, which isn’t very accurate. So there’s wiggle room, if you want to go that way.’

‘Let me get this straight,’ said Joe. ‘In Trahorne Refining, when a package came in, it went directly into the incinerator without being checked through.’

‘That’s correct.’

‘But in the lab you worked in before, you separated out these grindings, solids and sweeps.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Talk me through what happened with the package you opened.’

‘OK. The package came in from Dean Valtry’s lab in New York City. It’s a fifty-five gallon paper drum, about thirty inches high, eighteen inches across. I weighed it. Then I opened it and put everything in a big steel tray, which goes into the incinerator. I was pulling out a lot of black clothes and I found solids like I told you about, sweepings, some sheets of paper that the sweepings had been on, a piece of carpet. I’m shaking out the clothes and I see stains.’ He leaned forward. ‘And I know they’re bloodstains.’

‘So what did you do?’ said Danny.

‘I left everything and went up to Mr Trahorne’s
office with one of the items, a black top with a zip in it to show him. First of all I had to wait around for him – he was in a meeting. So I sat outside his office reading a magazine.’ He shrugged. ‘Like, a half hour later, his secretary comes out to get me. She’s all, like, don’t be bothering the boss for long. So I go in and Mr Trahorne asks me what I’ve been doing for the past half hour.’ Curtis rolled his eyes. ‘So I ignore that, but I tell him what happened with the package. And he listens to me and explains about how dental technicians can get blood on things if they cut their finger on the scalpels or whatever. And I’m like, I’m not a retard: this is a
lot
of blood, here. And I spread the thing out on his desk, which totally pisses him off. Then he grabs the top from me, walks me back down to “my post” he calls it and throws everything in the tray, pushes it into the incinerator. Looked me right in the eye afterwards and said, “I’m not paying you to sort. Or to take time out to bother me.” I’m, like, “some dude could have got hurt.” Trahorne’s looking at me like I’m such a dirt-bag he can’t believe I’d give a shit. That pissed me off. Then, I come in a week later and he’s letting me go.’ Curtis shrugged. ‘I’ll get other work, I know that. But, you know, I’s just trying to do the right thing.’

‘Mr Trahorne says you stole from the lab.’

Curtis looked up. ‘OK, yeah I did. A little platinum foil. One time.’

‘And he says you hold a grudge towards him because he fired you.’

‘Yeah. I do.’

Danny smiled.

‘I do hold a grudge,’ said Curtis. ‘Doesn’t make me a liar.’

‘OK,’ said Joe.

‘Also,’ said Curtis, ‘I ain’t got no grudge against that Valtry lab. I don’t know them. Why would I say this shit and imprecate them?’

‘We’re not accusing you of implicating them.’

He raised his head slowly and stared Danny down. ‘I said “imprecate”. It’s a word. Look it up.’

Danny let out a breath.

Joe arrived home at 8.30 and stood in front of the mirror in the bathroom, rubbing his stubbled jaw. He slipped a blade from his razor and flicked it towards the bin. It hit the wall first, then bounced onto the floor, taking some garbage with it. He bent down to pick it up and saw a scrunched-up drugstore receipt. He glanced at the two items on it: Tara’s SplashBronze tanner and something that sent his stomach into spasm: a pregnancy test. He ran his hands through the bin, looking for the box or the test. He couldn’t find them. He was about to give up, when he spotted the navy plastic cap of the test and pulled it free. Tests had changed. They now had a digital read-out. No checking symbols against a leaflet. No guessing. This one
just told it like it was: PREGNANT. Shaun’s whole life flashed before his eyes. Joe checked the date on the receipt. It was a week old. Joe put down his razor and went to Shaun’s room.

‘Son, I’m going to cut to the chase here,’ he said, sitting on Shaun’s bed. Shaun swung his chair around from his desk.

‘Yeah?’

‘I hope you’re … you know … with Tara … uh, using protection.’

‘Oh my God,’ said Shaun, looking away.

‘I’m serious. You need to be careful.’

‘This is so embarrassing. What makes you think I’m not?’