The Night Monster (26 page)

The Broward cops had conducted an extensive manhunt. Dogs, horses, choppers, and an army of volunteers had searched for Bolger. Not a trace of the young woman had been found. Not even her car had been located. In that regard, her case was different from Dunn’s. There was no evidence in the Bolger case to suggest foul play. She had simply vanished, something that happened to dozens of people in south Florida every year. Because of that, I had not considered her a possible victim in this case, but now I knew better. Bolger had been Mouse and Lonnie’s first victim.

I came to a padlocked gate at the end of the road. I hoisted Buster over, and climbed over myself. Standing next to Highway 27, I looked both ways. Not a car in sight.

I took Bolger’s license from my pocket, and studied her photo. She’d gone missing at the same time Daybreak had been shut down. Maybe a coincidence, only I didn’t believe in those. The solution to her disappearance was right in my hand.

My skin started to tingle. A story was taking shape in my mind. Nineteen years ago, Mouse and Lonnie had escaped Daybreak. They’d abducted Kathi Bolger and brought her to this remote farm. Something terrible had happened, and Bolger had died. Needing a replacement, they’d sought another woman similar to Bolger. That woman had been Naomi Dunn. And the cycle had continued, right until a few nights ago.

A flashing light caught my eye. A police cruiser was racing down 27 from the south. I hailed it down.

Although I’d left the force in disgrace, some cops considered me a hero for what I’d done. The one who responded to my 911 call belonged to that club. Officer Riski shook my hand, said it was a pleasure to meet me. He grabbed a T-shirt from the gym bag in his cruiser, and said I could keep it.

I put the T-shirt on, and found it was a perfect fit. It had the words
Broward County’s Finest
stenciled over the pocket. The irony wasn’t lost on me.

Riski cut the padlock on the gate to the farm. I loaded Buster into the cruiser, and we took off down the dirt road. By the time we’d reached the cracker house, I’d told Riski everything that had happened.

“You’re sure this is the woman’s grave,” Riski said.

“Yes,” I said.

Riski called CSI on his radio. Normal response time was twenty minutes. Riski would have to go back to 27 to meet them, just like I had for him. It gave me an idea, and I said, “With your permission, I’d like to look inside the house.”

“Think it might contain some clues?”

“Yes. I think the woman in the grave might have been kept there.”

“Go ahead. Just don’t touch anything,” Riski said.

I got out of the cruiser with Buster, and Riski drove back to the highway.

The cracker house was made of cinder block and had a pitched metal roof. As I shouldered open the front door, sunlight flooded the interior, followed by the scampering of little feet. I gave the critters a good head start, then let Buster loose.

I followed him inside. The front of the house was a combined living room/dining room, the few pieces of furniture covered in mold. I noticed the walls in the room were shifting. I had seen this phenomena before. The house was so thick with cockroaches that they made the wall panels move.

I stuck my head into the kitchen. The linoleum floor and counter-tops were coated with dust, which lifted eerily into the air whenever I exhaled.

In the back of the house were two small bedrooms. The first bedroom looked like a man cave, and contained a pair of twin beds, a boxy TV sitting on an upturned orange crate, several unopened crates of beer, and a pile of adult men’s magazines.

The second bedroom was more feminine. It had a queen-size bed, a dresser, and a vanity. Rifling the dresser drawers, I discovered an assortment of women’s clothes, including a see-through nightgown and several pieces of filmy lingerie.

From outside the house I heard a noise. A vehicle had pulled in, and I heard the CSI team get out of the van. I wanted to be there when the CSI team exhumed Bolger’s grave, and decided to leave.

I headed back to the front of the house. Buster had trapped a rat beneath the dining room table. I hooked my finger in his collar.

“Enough of that,” I said.

I noticed a stack of yellowing Polaroids lying on the table. Blowing away the dust, I picked up the photos by the corners. The photographs were so old, the subjects were starting to fade away. I placed
them in a row on the table. The deeper the photograph lay in the stack, the sharper the subjects became.

The last photo was the clearest. It was of Lonnie and a young woman, whom he held lovingly against his chest. Lonnie was much younger, and had a full head of dark hair. I studied the woman’s face. She was smiling through clenched teeth. A fake smile, probably done for the camera. Her eyes told another story. I had seen that look in the faces of abducted children I’d rescued who’d thought they were never going to be found. It was the look of hopelessness, of dread. Taking Kathi Bolger’s license from my pocket, I compared it to the photo.

It was the same person.

walked outside the house. Officer Riski stood beneath the shade of a tree, talking with the driver of the CSI van. I handed Riski the stack of Polaroids I’d found.

“I told you not to touch anything,” Riski said.

“They jumped into my hand,” I said. “May I have your permission to watch the CSI team exhume the body?”

“Promise me you won’t get in the way,” Riski said.

“I won’t get in the way,” I said.

“You’re a lousy liar,” Riski said.

Soon I was sitting on a tree stump in the forest, watching the exhumation. The CSI team consisted of three men and one woman. Each member wore a plastic Tyvek suit that tied around their necks, goggles, a paper mask, and rubber gloves. Tyvek suits were the newest thing in preventing crime scene contamination, and reminded me of homemade Halloween costumes that kids used to wear.

Bolger’s grave had been marked off with white string. Using hand shovels, the CSI team dug up the earth and dropped it into a metal sifter. When something of interest was found, it was cleaned, put in an evidence bag, and tagged. It was tedious work, but I was determined to see it out. The way a killer disposes of a victim can tell an
investigator many things, and I wanted to see Bolger’s body when it came out of the ground.

Three hours later, I got my wish.

A shovel hit bone. The team got on their knees, and removed the remaining dirt with their hands. Bolger’s body slowly became visible. It had been wrapped in plastic garbage bags, the tops tied together with wire. The team lifted Bolger out of the ground, and laid her gently down on blankets a few feet away.

The team’s captain was a soft-spoken detective named Christine Jowdy, who I’d worked with when I was on the force. Jowdy pulled a bottle of cheap cologne from her pocket and unscrewed the top.

“Who wants some?” Jowdy asked.

The other members of the team removed their surgical masks. Jowdy sprinkled cologne into each of the masks, then glanced up at me.

“Want to rub some over your lip?” Jowdy asked.

“No thanks,” I said.

“This could smell pretty bad.”

“I’m used to it.”

Jowdy shrugged and put the cologne away. She took a Swiss Army knife from her pocket and delicately cut away the plastic. To everyone’s surprise, Bolger’s body was swathed in blankets, and resembled an Egyptian mummy.

Bolger was photographed from a variety of different angles. It was starting to get late, and someone suggested getting lights to illuminate the grave area.

“If we move fast, we can beat the darkness,” Jowdy said.

Jowdy began to carefully cut away the blankets, which tore like paper. Bolger’s white shoes were the first thing I saw; then the skinless bones of her ankles; then her dress.
White shoes
. I inched closer as the rest became visible.

“You need to back up,” Jowdy said.

I was standing directly behind Jowdy, my feet glued to the ground.

“Did you hear what I just said?” Jowdy asked.

“Just let me see the rest,” I said quietly.

She glanced up at me, pissed. “What if I say no?”

“Come on. I found her.”

Jowdy let out an exasperated breath and cut away the remaining blankets. Bolger’s skeleton stared up at me. I tried to avoid looking at her face. She’d been buried in a white, ankle-length dress, and had her arms crossed in front of her chest. A plastic name tag was pinned to her shirt pocket. It said
Daybreak Nurse
.

Riski gave me a ride back to my Legend. He was one of the good guys, and went out of his way to call the police in the neighboring counties to see if the getaway vehicle had been spotted. So far, nothing.

Soon I was driving on 595 in my Legend. It was growing dark, and rush hour was starting to wane. The police department parking lot was empty as I pulled in.

I parked below Burrell’s office. The light was still on. Candy was like me in that regard. She lived the job. I called her on my cell.

“I was starting to worry about you,” Burrell said.

“It’s been a shitty day. I heard you scored a major drug bust.”

“We stepped in horseshit on that one. Any luck finding Sara Long?”

“I got close, but no cigar. I need a favor.”

“Name it.”

“I don’t want to ask you this over the phone.”

“Where then?”

“I’m parked just outside.”

“Give me a minute.”

Sixty seconds later, Burrell emerged from the police station and slipped into my car. Her clothes were starting to look like she’d slept in them. I rolled up the windows.

“Why the secrecy?” Burrell asked.

“I want you to weasel your way into the police department stockade. There’s a section that houses the department records archive. Each year has its own box of records. Take out the box for 1990.”

“What am I looking for?”

“A file on a mental health facility called Daybreak.”

“Why do you want to see that?”

“The two guys who abducted Sara Long were patients there. The giant is named Lonnie. He’s six-foot-ten, and one of the scariest people I’ve ever seen. Yet somehow no one I spoke to would admit to knowing him.”

“Why would they lie?” Burrell asked.

“I’m guessing a superior told them to.”

“You make that sound routine.”

“That sort of thing used to be routine. My rookie year, the chief sent out a ‘No one dies during spring break’ memo. He ordered the cops and the coroner not to report any student deaths to the media until after spring break was over. And we didn’t.”

“Did any kids die?”

“A couple did. They got drunk and fell off hotel balconies.”

Burrell stared at the empty building and didn’t speak for a while. She came from a family of cops, and liked to think that cops were different.

“Okay,” she finally said. “I’ll go to the stockade, and get the box. You want to come by, and look through the files with me?”

“I have to go to Broward General and check up on Karl Long,” I said. “I’ll call you when I’m done. Maybe we can hook up then.”

“Dinner’s on you,” she said.

entered Broward General Hospital through the main lobby. I had visited here enough times to be on a first-name basis with most of the staff and doctors. The receptionist was a tanned woman in her late-thirties named Dextra.

“Hello, Detective Carpenter, how have you been?” Dextra asked.

It had been a long time since anyone had called me detective. I didn’t see any point in correcting her. “I’ve been fine. I’m here to see a patient named Karl Long. He was flown in by chopper a few hours ago.”

Dextra tapped her keyboard and stared at her computer screen. “Let’s see. He’s not showing up on the new patient registry. Do you know what happened to him?”

“Gunshot wound.”

“Oh. Did you nail another bad guy?”

“I didn’t shoot him. Really.”

Dextra gave me a sly wink, and made a call on her phone. I drummed my fingers on the countertop and avoided her stare. Flirting with Dextra was the last thing I wanted to be doing right now. Hanging up, she said, “Karl Long is still down in the emergency room. You can go see him, if you’d like.”