Kovacliska - Ashes To Ashes Part 63

Everyone was a victim of something.

This group presented a depressing laundry list. Prost.i.tution, drugs,alcohol, a.s.sault, rape, incest-if what Kovac had been told about JillianBondurant was true. Victims of crime, victims of their upbringing.

From a distance, Jillian Bondurant would have seemed to have been theanomaly because she wasn't a prost.i.tute or in any s.e.x-a.s.sociatedprofession, but from the standpoint of her psychological profile, shewasn't all that far removed from Lila White or Fawn Pierce. Confused and conflicted feelings about s.e.x and about men. Low self-esteem.Emotionally needy. Outwardly, she would seem not to have had as hard alife as a streetwalking; prost.i.tute because she wasn't as vulnerable tothe same kind of crime and open violence. But there was nothing easyabout suffering in silence, covering up pain and damage to save face forthe family.

Quinn said there was considerable doubt that Jillian was dead at all,but that didn't mean she wasn't a victim. If she was Smokey Joe'saccomplice, she was just a victim of another sort. The Cremator himselfhad been a victim once. Victimization as a child was one of manycomponents that went into making a serial killer.

Everyone was a victim of something.

Kate turned to her own notes about Angie. Spare. Mostly hunches, thingsshe had learned in her years of studying people to see what shaped theirminds and their personalities. Abuse had shaped Angie Dimarco. Likelyfrom a very early age. She expected the worst of people, dared them toshow it to her, to prove her right. And that had undoubtedly happenedagain and again, because the kind of people who lived in Angie's worldtended to live down to expectations. Angie included.

She expected people to dislike her, to distrust her, to cheat her, touse her, and made certain that they did. This case had been noexception.

Sabin and the police had wanted nothing more than to use her, and Katehad been their tool. Angie's disappearance was an inconvenience to them,not a tragedy. If not for her status as a witness, no one on earth wouldhave posted a reward or flashed her photograph on television asking"Have you seen this girl?" Even then, the police were not putting fortha tremendous search effort to find her. The energies of the task forcewere all dedicated to finding the suspect, not the A.W.O.L witness.

Kate wondered if Angie might have seen the spots on the news. She wouldhave enjoyed the notoriety, the attention. She might secretly havepretended to believe someone actually cared about her.

"K*y would you care what happens to me?" the girl had asked as theystood in the hall outside Kate's office.

"Because no one else does." And I didn't care enough, Kate thought witha heavy heart. She'd been afraid to. Just as she had been afraid to letJohn back into her life.

Afraid to feel that deeply. Afraid of the pain that kind of feelingcould bring with it.

What a pathetic way to live. No--that wasn't living, that was simplyexisting.

Was the girl alive? she wondered, getting up from the couch to prowl theroom. Was she dead? Had she been taken? Had she just left?

Am I being unrealistic to think there's even a question here?

She'd seen the blood for herself. Too much of it for a benignexplanation.

But how could Smokey Joe have known where she was? What were the chancesof his having spotted her at the PD and followed her to the Phoenix?Slim.

Which would mean he would have to have found out some other way. Whichmeant he either had some in with the case .. . or an in with Angie.

Who had known where Angie was staying? Sabin, Rob, the task force, acouple of uniforms, the Urskines, Peter Bondurant's lawyerand thereforePeter Bondurant.

The Urskines, who had known the first victim and had a peripheralconnection to the second. They hadn't known Jillian Bondurant, but herconnection to these crimes had given Toni Urskine a platform for her cause.

Gregg had been there at the house Wednesday night when Kate had leftAngie off. Just Gregg and Rita Renner, who gave all the appearances...o...b..ing an Urskine puppet. Rita Renner, who had been friends with FawnPierce.

Kate had known the Urskines for years. While Toni might drive someone tokill, she couldn't imagine the couple practicing that hobby themselves.

Then again, no one in Toronto had ever suspected the Ken and Barbiekillers, and that couple had committed murders so hideous, veteran copshad broken down and wept on the witness stand during the trial.

G.o.d, what a sinister thought-that the Urskines might take women in usingkindness and caring as a front for a s.a.d.i.s.tic hunting game. But surelythey wouldn't be so stupid as to prey on their own clientele.

They would be automatic suspects. And if the man Angie had seen in thepark that night had been Gregg Urskine, then she would have r cognizedhim at the Phoenix, wouldn't she?

Kate thought of the vague description the girl had given of Smokey Joe,the almost nondescript sketch, trying to make some sense of it all.

Had she been so reluctant, so vague, because she was frightened, as Katehad suspected? Or because-as Angie said-it was dark, he wore a hood, ithappened so fast? Or did her motivation lie elsewhere?

The task force had a hot suspect, Kate knew. Quinn was probablyinterviewing him right now. The caretaker from Jillian's town housecomplex. He had no inside connection to the case, but she supposed hecould have known Angie if she had ever trolled for johns in the areaaround the Target Center, where he worked as a security guard.

But it didn't make sense for Angie to have a connection to the killer.

If she knew him and wanted him caught, she would have given him up. Ifshe knew him and didn't want him caught, she would have given a cleardescription of a phantom for the cops to chase.

And if she hadn't seen anything at all in the park that night, why wouldshe say she had? For three squares and a place to stay? For attention?

Then it would have made more sense for her to be cooperative rather thandifficult.

Everything about this kid was a mystery inside a puzzle wrapped in anenigma.

"Wich is why I don't do kids.

But this one was-had been-her responsibility, and she would find out thetruth about her or die trying.

"Poor choice of words, Kate," she muttered, heading upstairs to changeclothes.

Twenty minutes later, she was out the back door. It had snowed anotherinch during the night, giving the landscape a clean dusting of freshwhite powder, coating the back steps where a pair of boots had lefttracks.

Quinn had gone out the front this morning, to a waiting cab. The trackswere too small to be his, at any rate. They were more the size of Kate'sfeet, though that didn't necessarily establish gender.

Carefully staying to one side of them, Kate followed the tracks down thestairs to the yard. The trail led past the end of her garage and downthe far side, down the narrow corridor befween the building and theneighbor's weathered-gray privacy fence, to the side entrance of thegarage. M the doors were closed.

A chill ran through her. She thought back to last night and someonedefecating in the garage. She thought of the suddenly burned-out light,the feeling Wednesday night that someone had been watching her as she'dmade her way from the garage to the house.

She looked around, down the deserted alley. Most of the neighbors hadfences that hid the first stories of their homes from view. Secondstorywindows looked black and empty. The neighborhood was full ofwhite-collar professionals, most of whom left for work by seven-thirty.

Kate backed away from the garage, heart pumping, hand digging in her bagfor her cell phone. Moving toward the house, she pulled the phone out,flipped it open, and punched the power b.u.t.ton. Nothing happened. Thebattery had died in the night. The inconvenience of modern convenience.

She kept her eyes on the garage, thought she saw a movement through theside window. Car thief? Burglar? Rapist? Disgruntled client? Cremator?

She stuffed the phone back in her bag and pulled out her house keys. Shelet herself in, locked herself in, and breathed again.

"I need this like I need the plague," she muttered, going into thekitchen. She put her tote and her purse on the table and started to slipout of her coat, when the sound registered in her brain. The low, feralgrowl of a cat. Thor was under the table, snarling, ears flat.

The fine hair rose up on the back of Kate's neck, and with it the itchyfeeling of being watched.

Options raced through her mind. She had no idea how close the personmight be behind her, or how close they might be to the door.

The phone was on the wall on the other end of the room-too far away.

Casually opening the tote, she looked inside with an eye for a weapon.

She didn't carry a gun. The canister of pepper spray she had carried fora while had expired and she'd thrown it out. She had a plastic bottle ofAleve, a packet of Kleenex, the heel from the shoe she'd ruined Monday.

She dug a little deeper and found a metal nail file, palmed that, andslipped it into her coat pocket. She knew her escape routes. She wouldturn, confront, break right or left. Plan set, she counted to five andturned around.

The kitchen was empty. But framed by the doorway to the dining room,sitting on one of Kate's straight-backed oak chairs, was Angie Dimarco.

"HE CONFESSES TO having Jillian Bondurant's underpants, and you don'tthink he's the guy?" Kovac said, incredulous.

His temper had a direct effect on his driving, Quinn noticed. TheCaprice roared down 94, rocking like a clown car. Quinn braced his feetin the floor well, knowing his legs would snap like toothpicks in thecrash.

Of course, it probably wouldn't matter, because he would be dead. Thispiece-of-c.r.a.p car would crumple like an empty beer can.

"I'm just saying there are some things I don't like," he said.

"Vanlees doesn't strike me as a team player. He lacks the arrogance tobe the top dog, and the s.a.d.i.s.tic male is virtually always the dominantpartner in a couple that kills. The woman is subservient to him, avictim who counts herself lucky not to be the one he's murdering."

"So this time it's reversed," Kovac insisted. "The woman runs the show.

Why not? Moss and Liska say his wife had him p.u.s.s.y-whipped."

"His mother probably did too. And yes, it's often a domineering ormanipulative or otherwise influential woman in his past or present as.e.xual s.a.d.i.s.t is killing symbolically when he kills his victims. Thatall fits, but there are holes too. I wish I could say I just look at himand like him for these murders, but I'm not feeling that bolt oflightning."

But then, that feeling had more or less deserted him in recent years, hereminded himself. Doubt had become more the rule than the exception, sowhat the h.e.l.l did he know anymore? Why should he trust his instinctsnow?

Kovac swerved the car across three lanes to the exit he wanted.

"Well, I can tell you, the, powers that be like this guy fine. You talkabout lightning. They're all getting a G.o.dd.a.m.n thunderstorm in theirpants over Vanlees. He's got a history, he fits the profile, he has aconnection to Jillian, access to hookers, and he's not Peter Bondurant.

If they can find a way to charge him, they will. If they can, they'll doit in time for the press conference today."

And if Vanlees wasn't the guy, they ran the risk of pushing the realkiller into proving himself again. The thought made Quinn ill.

"Vanlees says Peter was in Jillian's place predawn Sunday morning, andsent n.o.ble on Monday to pay him to keep his mouth shut," he said,drawing a frighteningly long stare from Kovac. The Caprice began todrift toward a rusted-out Escort in the next lane.

"Jesus, will you watch the road!" Quinn snapped. "How do they give outdriver's licenses in this state? You save up bottle caps or something?"

"Beer-can tabs," Kovac replied, returning his attention to the traffic.

"So Bondurant was the one who cleaned up Jillian's house and erased themessages on the answering machine."

"I'd say so-if Vanlees is telling the truth. And I think it's a safe betthen that Peter is the reason you didn't find any of Jillian's ownmusical compositions. He might have taken them because they revealedsomething about his relationship with Jillian."

"The s.e.xual abuse."

"Possibly."

"Son of a b.i.t.c.h," Kovac muttered. "Sunday morning. Smokey Joe didn'tlight up the body until midnight. Why would Bondurant go to her placeSunday morning, wipe the place down, take the music, if he didn'talready know she was dead?"

"Why would he wipe the place down at all?" Quinn asked. "He owns thetown house. His daughter lived there. His fingerprints wouldn't be outof place."

Kovac cut him a glance. "Unless they were b.l.o.o.d.y."

Quinn braced a hand against the dash as a tow truck cut in front of themand Kovac hit the brakes. "Just drive, Kovak. Or we won't live longenough to find out."

WITH RUMORS OF a suspect in custody, the media circus had begun anew onthe street in front of Peter Bondurant's house. Videographers roamed theboulevard, taking exterior shots of the mansion while on-air talent didtheir sound checks. Quinn wondered if anyone had even bothered to callthe families of Lila White or Fawn Pierce.

Two Paragon security officers stood at the gate with walkie-talkies.

Quinn flashed his ID and they were waved through to the house.

Edwyn n.o.ble's black Lincoln was parked in the drive with a steel-blueMercedes sedan beside it. Kovac pulled in behind the Lincoln, so closethe cars were nearly kissing b.u.mpers.

Quinn gave him a look. "Promise you'll behave yourself" Kovac played itinnocent. He had been relegated to the role of driver and wasn't to leave the car. He wasn't to cross Peter Bondurant's field of vision.

Quinn had kept Gil Vanlees's revelation to himself, as an added precaution. The last thing he needed was Kovac hulling his way into this.

"Take your time, GQ. I'll just be sitting here reading the paper."

He picked up a copy of the Star-Ttibune from the pile of junk on the seat. Gil Vanlees took up half the front page-headline story, sidebar,

and a bad photograph that made him look like Popeye's archnemesis, Bluto.

Kovac's eyes were on the house, scanning the windows.

n.o.ble met Quinnat the door, frowning, looking past him to the Caprice.

In the car, Kovac had his newspaper open. He held it in such a way as to

give Edwyn n.o.ble the finger.

"Don't worry," Quinn said. "You managed to get the best cop on the case busted to chauffeur."

"We understand Vanlees has been taken into custody," the attorney said

as they went into the house, ignoring Kovac as an unworthy topic.

"He was arrested on a DUI. The police will hold him as long as they can, but at the moment they don't have any evidence he's the Cremator."

"But he had .. . something of Jillian's," n.o.ble said with the