The First Cut (25 page)

She nodded. She didn’t know if she could speak. She gave it a try. “Yes.” Her voice was raspy. She’d been in and out of consciousness for what seemed like days. She didn’t even know if it was day or night.

“Where am I?”

He smiled. It was a gorgeous smile, which made it all the more chilling. “A fun place.”

“What city?”

“Why does that matter?”

“Are we near Hermosa?”

“Close to it.”

“Are we near Los Angeles?”

“Yes.” His voice was clipped. He was peeved. “We’re near Los Angeles.”

She stopped probing. She felt better knowing she was not far from home. She didn’t want to die someplace she didn’t know. She realized the idea was ridiculous, but it gave her a modicum of comfort. She was born in Southern California. She’d always thought she’d die there. At least she could have that, if it came to that.

He continued playing. He was pretty good, she thought, and couldn’t jibe the image of the musician, the sensitive artist, with that of the brutal psychopath who had abducted and raped her.

“It’s Bach. Prelude in C Minor. Do you like Bach?”

He didn’t wait for her response, but returned to his music. He might as well have been talking to a dog.

Lisa fought the urge to block everything out. To hide. She wanted to close her eyes, but forced them to stay open. She had to be here, in the moment. She had to watch everything. Pay attention. Learn any weakness in her surroundings or in him. She had to look for something she could use to escape. She had no doubt that he intended to kill her. This was too elaborate a setup for any other purpose. But she didn’t think he was going to kill her today. She was still a new toy, not yet broken.

He stopped playing then yawned and stretched, holding the guitar by its neck. With a groan, he stood. He placed the guitar onto a stand.

He was magnificent, but the sight of him left her beyond cold. She noticed keys dangling from a leather cord around his neck. “So, you’re a musician.”

“I have been. Been lots of things.”

Sounded like an opening. She’d keep him talking. Make him get to know her. She’d read somewhere that killers turned their victims into objects. Dehumanized them. She wouldn’t let him do that to her. She’d make sure he knew who she was, even if he refused to acknowledge it. She’d always been a good talker. It was one of her best attributes, although her father told her that the gift of gab was a double-edge sword: strength and weakness.

“My name is Lisa Leona Shipp.”

Her headache pounded behind her eyes. Talking made it worse. Her voice reverberated as if she were inside a steel drum.

“Leona is my grandmother’s name on my mother’s side.”

From the refrigerator, he took a beer and twisted off the cap. “I couldn’t care less, sweetheart.”

“My name is Lisa Leona Shipp. I’m thirty years old. I grew up in Torrance and I live in Hermosa Beach. I work as a teacher’s assistant at a grammar school there. Just started. I did temp office work for a long time. I’m studying for my teaching credentials at night. I’m the first one in my family to have a white-collar job. I come from a family of drunks and—”

“Honey, I don’t care about your sad story. Everybody’s got one.”

Lisa felt her bravado draining away. “I’ve been sober for a month. I just celebrated my anniversary when…” She decided to drop that conversational thread.

He opened another beer and poured it into a plastic cup.

“I’ve never been married, but I was engaged once. I blew that because of my drinking. I’d like to get married and have a family.”

He approached the bed.

She gasped but forced herself to keep talking. The chains reached just far enough for her to cover her breasts with her hands. “My hobbies are surfing, movies…”

He bent close to her neck and inhaled deeply.

“…knitting. I’ve started knitting…It’s very calming. I work out. Never used to. The new Lisa works out. I jog on the beach almost every day. I like to read. Mostly history and biographies, but I like a good mystery, too. It keeps me busy.”

He closed his eyes as if trying to separate the undertones of a fine wine. He made a small noise of pleasure and moved his head down her body. She felt his breath as he smelled her all over.

She unconsciously pinched her skin as she held herself more tightly. “I have so much more time since I’ve stopped drinking…” She let out a bleat of pain.

He’d bit her on the toe. He leered at her, his head above her feet. “Shut up.”

She obeyed.

He grabbed a pair of pants tossed over the back of an easy chair and put them on. Using one of the keys around his neck, he unlocked the cuff on her right ankle.

She flinched when he touched her.

From the floor, he picked up a longer chain and locked this around her ankle. He then unlocked the other cuffs.

She sat up and drew in her knees, dizzy with the effort. She was sore in places she didn’t want to think about. She pulled on the chain. It was narrow gauge and about six feet long.

He picked up the cup of beer and held it out to her, a taunting look on his face.

“No thanks.” She desperately wanted it, but she could not. To take it would do more than betray her pledge. It would acknowledge that she was lost. She was not lost. She was going to get out of there. Oh, her head hurt. At least the pounding headache made her forget about the rest of her body.

“Honey, I’m not impressed by your sobriety. I make my living off drunks. If I were you, I’d take the drink. I’d take as many as I could get.”

She could smell the beer in the cup and on his breath. The cup was full to the brim. A circle of creamy foam lined the edge. It was cold. She could see condensation around his fingers. She knew how it would taste. How icy it would feel going down. She was thirsty. It took every ounce of willpower to shake her head no.

“I would like some water though, if you have it.”

“Suit yourself.” He chugged down the beer without stopping until it was gone. Then he wiped the foam from his lips and burped. He pressed his fingers against his lips with a sheepish grin. “Excuse me.”

“Do you have aspirin or something?”

“Headache, huh? I’ll get some.” First he took a plastic bottle of water from the refrigerator and handed it to her.

“Are you cold?” he asked.

From a cabinet beneath the counter, he took out a bundle, peeled off a plastic wrapper, and tossed her a brand-new fleece coverlet.

He ascended stairs against the far wall.

She thought she heard him unlock then relock two sets of doors.

She couldn’t figure him out. Not that she had any basis for comparison. He had kidnapped and brutalized her, yet seemed concerned about her comfort. She’d witnessed how quickly his polite demeanor could turn menacing. She recalled his dark eyes and sadistic smile when, inside his car, he’d grabbed her and held the cloth over her face. He was a Jekyll and Hyde. The worst monsters live among us, pretending they are one of us. Like that BTK killer, they marry, have families, attend church, are active in the community, and it’s all part of their disguise. That’s how they get away with rape, torture, and murder for years and years, right beneath our noses.

“Stop it, Lisa. Don’t go there. Stay strong.”

She twisted the cap from the water and thirstily drank. Clutching the coverlet around her, she stretched her legs over the side of the bed. It was high off the ground. Her toes touched the plastic that covered the carpet. She looked past the bed and saw the sheet she was standing on was still attached to a large roll. Was it there to gather things that might fall on the ground, like hair and blood? Torn off fingernails?

“Lisa, knock it off,” she told herself.

She stood and her head swam. She waited until she got her bearings and then walked to the bathroom. The chain was long enough to reach. There was a bathtub with a shower inside. The space was spotless and smelled strongly of bleach. She used the toilet.

A plastic curtain hung from steel tubing over the bathtub. It was printed with a cheerful pattern of fishes and looked brand-new. She slowly drew it back. The shower and bathtub were molded of a synthetic material in one solid piece. It also looked brand-new and like something that could be easily removed. A fresh bar of soap was there along with new bottles of shampoo and cream rinse in brands she didn’t recognize but looked expensive. There was a loofah and a nail brush.

She was glad to have access to a bathroom and to find it tidy, but the antiseptic cleanliness unnerved her. More plastic sheeting lay atop the linoleum. She leaned over, making her head pound more, and picked up the edge. The linoleum looked bright and new.

She went to the sink. What she had thought was a mirror was a sheet of shiny metal bolted to the wall, similar to what stood in for glass mirrors at highway rest stops. It dimly reflected her image. Mirrors in the other room abounded, but they could be moved. She could reach this one.

“A suicide would ruin his fun, or maybe he doesn’t want someone stabbing him with a piece of broken mirror. Gee Lisa, you’re starting to think like him. Maybe that’s good.”

A brand-new bar of soap, a large off-white oval, was on the sink. Embossed in its center was a French word. There were high-priced bottles of lotion. The label on one specified it was just for the face. Another only for feet. A third that she guessed was for the rest. A plastic cup held a new toothbrush in a box and a tube of toothpaste. There was a hairbrush, comb, and plastic bottle of mouthwash. There was a stack of skimpy towels in assorted sizes on a chrome hotel rack bolted to the wall. The sink was of the same cheap synthetic material as the bathtub and the fixtures would have felt at home in a Motel 6.

Everything was disposable.

All of a sudden her skin crawled, as if tainted by his touch.

She pulled off a mat draped over the side of the tub and put it on the floor. She turned on the shower. The water flowed cold and she would have settled for that, but then it warmed up and eventually became hot. She climbed into the tub, dragging the chain with her. She didn’t care if he didn’t want her to do this. The hot water beat on her. She poured on shampoo and clawed her scalp with her fingernails. She wet the loofah and rubbed her skin until it was raw. She scrubbed beneath her nails, hands, and feet, working with a frenzy until the brush cut her skin.

She stepped onto the mat, pulled towels from the rack, and dried herself. She slathered on the lotion and brushed her teeth.

She looked at the mess. Her hair was in the tub. Towels littered the floor. She made a move to mop up with a used towel, then started to laugh. He’d kidnapped and raped her and was probably going to kill her, and she was concerned about being a poor houseguest.

She made a toga of the coverlet and combed out her hair in the pseudo mirror. The sheet of polished metal was a benefit. It was probably best that she could not see herself clearly. Beneath the sink, she found a hairdryer. There were also extra rolls of toilet paper, boxes of tissues, tampons, and sanitary napkins. It was so well thought out and so perverse. She imagined him setting the feminine hygiene products on the store counter, explaining to the cashier, “Just a few things for my torture chamber.”

Figures. The most considerate man she’d ever been with was a psychopath.

She started drying her hair. She closed her eyes and tried to imagine she was in her little rented house near the beach.

An old gospel standard entered her head. One she’d latched onto in recovery. “This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine…”

She finished her hair, turned off the dryer, and whispered the last of the chorus. She tightened the toga, blinked away tears, and returned to the bed. She longed to sit in a chair but they were beyond her reach.

He returned carrying a tray loaded with food—sandwiches, chips, fruit—and six Advil tablets, all on plastic plates. There was a plastic fork and spoon, but no knife.

He opened a tray table, set down the food, and pulled up a chair. He gestured for her to sit.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” He seemed pleased with the food he’d presented her. “I don’t know what you like to eat, but I’m not going to starve you to death.” He chuckled and that boyish glimmer again entered his eyes.

“It looks great.” She had been a vegetarian for many years, but didn’t complain, picking up a roast beef sandwich and taking a bite. She needed to keep up her strength. The beef was good. She’d forgotten how good. She downed two Advils.

“Um…Could I have my clothes?”

“No.”

“I would feel more comfortable with my clothes.”

“I prefer you naked.”

She ate. He sat a few feet away, watching her, a satisfied smile on his lips.

She blurted out the question on her mind, mostly to test him. To see if he wavered. She soon regretted it. “Are you going to kill me?”

“Yes.”

T W E N T Y - T H R E E

V
INING GOT A RIDE TO THE STATION WITH JULIE PRINCIPE, THE
mother of Emily’s friend Aubrey. Vining was picking up her Crown Vic today. Julie worked for a group of general practitioners in an office near Huntington Hospital, not far from the police station. The hospital was yet another monument to the legacy of railroad magnate Henry E. Huntington in the region.

It was the girls’ last week of school before summer vacation, and they excitedly chatted about upcoming trips and plans. Emily would go with her father and his family for two weeks at their mountain cabin in Big Bear. Later in the summer, she would join Aubrey and her family for a week in a rental house near the beach in Cambria. Emily and Vining would go camping along the Kern River in Sequoia with Vining’s sister and her family. The two of them would spend a long weekend in San Diego and would take day trips on many of Vining’s days off. Between sojourns, Emily was taking a photography class.

Vining set out to make Emily’s summer busy and fun. The girl had spent enough time with worry and blackness and consumed with her mother’s issues. Vining knew firsthand how unfair that was.

Vining tried to participate in the conversation but she was distracted. Almost forty-eight hours had passed since they’d found Frankie’s body. They had no solid suspects. She caught herself unconsciously fidgeting with the necklace. She put her hands in her lap and focused on the female gabbing.