Dead Suite Part 20

"I've never seen him before."

"That's the real Hugh Pacheo."

Sadie stared at the picture and shook her head. "Definitely not the guy who met me."

The detective took the photo back. "Good. I'd hate to think the guy came back from the dead to hang his own son but, when dealing with you, I know not to leave any stone unturned." He sounded less than happy about it. "I'm going to need you to come down to the station and give me a full report on the record."

"I gotta do this job first," Sadie said. "I'm not getting enough work these days. I can't afford to throw one away. It's two blocks away."

"Fine. I can live with that." He hooked a thumb in the direction of the house. "I got work cut out for me here anyway. This job you've got, is there any chance it could be connected to this one or the others?"

Sadie gave him the details of the suicide job and he nodded his head.

"I didn't get the call on that one, so I'll check with the officers involved. You think it's a straight-up suicide though?"

"Yes." Sadie nodded. "Although, I thought the same about this one."

"Right. You'll call me when you finish up and we'll get everything you know on paper, okay? I'm going to want access to all your files too. This thing is connected to you and we gotta figure out what that link is."

Sadie kept meticulous records and told Petrovich he was welcome to come to her house and go through them.

Before he hoisted himself out of Sadie's car he asked her, "By the way, I don't suppose you had any visitors when you were cleaning here?" He put the word visitors in air quotes.

Sadie shook her head. "No, but I don't get suicides talking to me, so-" She stopped short. "But it wasn't a suicide after all." She tapped her chin thoughtfully. "I remember catching the glimpse of something in my peripheral vision when I worked in the garage. I thought it was my mind playing tricks on me. Do you want me to try and contact someone here?"

He looked pained as he shook his head. "How about we just go about figuring this out the old-fashioned way?"

"Fine. No trying to talk to the dead. Was there any evidence found on my van?" Sadie asked.

"Tons of prints. Yours and some of the workers at the hotel on the back door. Nothing on or near the windshield." He sputtered loudly. "I don't get it. Somehow you're connected to this. It's like the guy wants you to be the one to catch him."

"I'm more than a little freaked out," Sadie said seriously.

"I'll arrange to have a uniform car drive by your place every hour or so, okay? But it would be better for you to stay with someone. A friend? Your mom?"

"I'll think about it." She nodded and thanked him. Sadie knew a lot of killing could get done in the fifty-nine minutes between the times an officer would drive by her place, but there was no way she'd bunk with her family while some serial killer had her in his crosshairs.

"Dean, there's one more thing. . . ."

Sadie had left it to the end. She felt oddly reluctant to remove the necklace from around her neck, but now she handed it over to the detective.

"Hugh Pacheo . . . or the guy claiming to be him, gave me this necklace. He also gave me a song and dance about not being able to pay me until his pension check came and would I please wear the necklace all the time to bring me good luck until we met again with the payment for my services."

"And you believed that load of c.r.a.p?" Petrovich held the pendant up and stared at it hard.

"Well, like I said . . . he seemed like an okay guy and-"

She was interrupted by Petrovich reading the back of the gold disc.

"Carnalem concupiscentiam est insatiabilis." He shook his head slowly as he looked at Sadie. "Do you know what that translates to?"

"I never studied Latin, but Hugh, um, the guy pretending to be Hugh, said it was some sort of good-luck message."

"No," Petrovich snapped. "It loosely translates to 'Carnal desire is insatiable.' Doesn't sound like a good luck charm to me."

Sadie's throat grew tight and she chewed her lower lip.

"I didn't know you studied Latin."

"I dabbled in college." Petrovich was still staring at the necklace.

"You're right. It doesn't sound like good luck," Sadie sniffed.

"No, but it does sound like the motto of our killer. Wait here."

He climbed out of the car and Sadie watched as he took the necklace over to his vehicle and securely tucked it away in an evidence bag he retrieved from his trunk. Then he approached the investigators in the garage and turned it over. When he came back to Sadie's car he was silent awhile and she knew he was weighing whether or not to tell her something.

"The three girls killed at the hotels . . . ," he began slowly. "They didn't die from knife wounds."

"Was it the drug c.o.c.ktail that killed them? The same thing used to drug Lester Pacheo before he died?"

"No. The drug mixture was solely to incapacitate the victims so that he could kill them without a struggle."

"Then if it wasn't the drugs, and it wasn't multiple knife wounds . . ."

"They were strangled. Before they were stabbed, they were choked to death and the killer didn't use his hands." He reached and placed a hand on Sadie's arm in a rare showing of emotion. "From the markings on the girls' necks, the ME believes the killer used a thick gold chain."

Sadie shook her head violently, trying to erase the idea from her head.

"This was clearly a warning. He got off on the idea of you wearing it until he could kill you with it."

Sadie's hand went to her throat.

"What do I do?"

Petrovich offered to stay with Sadie until a friend came to get her, but she declined. She was still a professional and she still had a job to do, she told him. However, he wouldn't be put off and insisted that she call a friend to find a place to stay. She thought about her sister, Dawn, or Maeva but they had babies, and that changed everything. Petrovich wasn't leaving until she called someone, so, reluctantly, she dialed Rosemary. Sadie was careful not to tell her about the new evidence, particularly not in front of the detective who'd have a cow if he knew of Rosemary's habit of video and blogging about events.

"She says it's no problem if I stay with her," Sadie told him.

"Good. Go do your job, but you keep in contact. I will bring you down and get your statement probably tomorrow." He pointed to a patrol car. "He'll be following you too."

Sadie nodded and once she'd pulled away from the curb and left Petrovich to tend to evidence collection, her hand went to her heart pounding inside her chest as if she could stop her fear.

On her way to the self-inflicted gunshot job, Sadie called back Rosemary and thanked her for allowing her to stay. She also said that once she'd finished the cleanup job, she wanted to get together with her and Maeva.

"I'll see if she's available to come over," Rosemary said. "You sound strange. Is everything okay?"

"No," Sadie replied, her voice shaking. "Everything is far from okay."

Chapter 15.

Sadie returned to Bellefield Park Lane and was very relieved to see the patrol car follow her there. She immersed herself in cleaning up the blood spatter in the small bathroom. She hummed softly from behind her respirator and tried not to think about being next on a serial killer's list.

It was just after seven when Sadie wrapped things up. She stacked the waste containers neatly near the door but figured she'd wait until she got her van back to haul it all away. She'd talked to the client and mentioned the job was basically done with the exception of some waste removal. The woman was fine with Sadie leaving the bins there for a few days if necessary.

Next on her agenda was, hopefully, a gathering of her psychic friend network for a brainstorming session. Sadie texted Rosemary that she was done in Bellevue and that her plan was to go home, shower, and pack an overnight bag before coming over. When she walked to her car, she stopped first at the patrol car parked behind her.

"I'm going home now to wash up and pack a bag before going to my friend's for the night."

"I'm to stay on your tail," the officer stated, and he offered Sadie a bright smile.

Sadie thought he looked entirely too happy to be a.s.signed the task of babysitting her. As she walked to her car, she began to wonder if he was happy about it because he considered her bait for a serial killer that he might get the chance at catching.

Sadie was prepared to spend only a small amount of time at home, but when she pulled up to her house, Rosemary's Mini Cooper was in the driveway. Sadie pulled around the car and into her garage. When she walked into her house she was. .h.i.t by the distinct smell of smoldering sage, cedar, and sweetgra.s.s.

"Are you trying to burn my place down?" Sadie called out as she walked into her living room.

"We did a cleansing smudge," Maeva called out with a half wave to Sadie.

"And a circle of protection too," Rosemary added. "And now I'm just drinking your wine and Maeva's drinking your juice."

I really need to talk to my friends about the proper uses of an emergency key.

"You're here without a baby in tow? Guess you're taking advantage of the fact that Osbert will take a bottle?"

"Yup. Not only that, but Terry took a catering job out of town tonight and I've got the next-door neighbor teenager babysitting for two whole hours."

"That's great. I've gotta shower off," Sadie told them. "Then we'll get down to business."

"Take your time," Maeva called out over her shoulder as she flicked on the television. "I pumped before I left so there's no hurry. I feel like a new woman."

Sadie couldn't help but feel it would be somewhat nice to have a conversation with Maeva that didn't somehow center around her friend's b.r.e.a.s.t.s.

It was twenty minutes later when Sadie felt properly unsoiled and sterilized. Even though she wore biohazard clothing to clean on a job, she insisted on showering off after work as an extra precaution. Of course, showering did little to remove the smell of body decomp from her sinuses.

Sadie slipped into sweatpants and a T-shirt and stuffed spare clothes into a small overnight bag before joining her friends in the living room.

Maeva had Hairy on her lap and was talking in a baby voice as she stroked his back. "You're just the cutest bunny-wunny, aren't you?"

Sadie settled onto a chair and regarded her friends with a weary smile.

"So let's get down to business before Maeva starts baby-talking to all of us just because she misses...o...b..rt," Rosemary said, only half joking. "If you're wanting to bunk at my place, something must be rotten in Denmark."

"If by rotten you mean somebody's threatening to kill me and if by Denmark you mean Seattle, then yes." Sadie ran her fingers through her damp hair. "I'm going to give you the high points of what I know, but you have to solemnly swear on whatever you hold dear that you aren't going to leak this information to anyone and you definitely won't blog, video, or report it in any way, shape, or form."

"Sheesh, you really know how to take the fun out of everything," Rosemary said. "But I promise I only made that mistake once. If I ever video or blog about anything concerning any of you, I'll get your consent first."

Sadie began to tell them everything she knew and when she got to the part about the necklace Maeva and Rosemary simultaneously gasped in shock.

"It's from the Malleus Maleficarum," Rosemary said.

"What's that?" Sadie asked.

"Basically a bulls.h.i.t book written in the 1400s that fueled the witch trials," Maeva said. "That quote on the necklace was part of a line in the book that said all witchcraft comes from carnal l.u.s.t."

"So he used the necklace to kill the prost.i.tutes and then also sliced and diced them? Talk about overkill!" Rosemary shook her head.

"Do you think this crazy guy killed the prost.i.tutes because he thought they were witches?" Sadie asked.

"There's no way of climbing inside this guy's head," Maeva said. "Why did he give you the necklace? You're not a prost.i.tute, or a witch."

"I think that necklace was the reason you felt sick," Rosemary said evenly. "I think it was cursed."

Sadie laughed at the thought of a cursed necklace but then stopped in mid-guffaw. "I have been feeling a lot better. I thought I was coming down with the flu . . . dizzy, light-headed, and nauseated." Sadie shrugged. "Now I feel back to my normal anxious and exhausted self."

"We'll need to get that necklace back from Detective Petrovich and cleanse it so it doesn't have the power to hurt anyone else," Rosemary stated.

"You know what the good part about the necklace is?" Maeva asked with a sly smile. "It means the fake Hugh Pacheo guy is the killer. Not Owen Sorkin. You can boink him to your heart's delight!"

"Well, I get the feeling that if we find the connection between you and the Halladay house, we'll solve this," Rosemary added firmly. "For now, I need to drive Maeva back home and then I'll get you back to my place, where I will cook you a fabulous dinner and take your mind off your troubles."

"I'll meet you at your place," Sadie told her.

"I'm not leaving you alone." Maeva crossed her arms over her chest.

"There's a cop outside who's been told to stick to my tail," Sadie a.s.sured her. "You're free to go."

"Too bad I never got a chance to see if I could get a reading off the necklace," Rosemary remarked as she slipped her shoes on.

"Maeva tried but she only thought about soup." Sadie chuckled.

"Soup?" Rosemary's eyebrows went up as she looked at Maeva. "Why soup?"

"'Stone Soup.'" Maeva slipped on her jacket. "Obviously I've been reading too many kids' stories to Osbert."

"I've never heard of a children's story named 'Stone Soup,' but Rick and I often go to the Stone Soup Theatre near Stone and Fortieth."

Rosemary fished her keys out of her purse and when she looked up Maeva and Sadie were staring at her.

"There's a Stone Soup Theatre?" Sadie asked excitedly. "Maeva, do you think that's what you connected to when you got a vibe off the necklace?"