Jon Talton - Powers of Arrest

“This guy’s got balls,” Dodds said. “The killer, I mean, not the vic. He does this guy in public, in one of the most prominent landmarks in the city. If his note is accurate, he set out to kill three healthy young people in one shot. Thinks he’s the god of murder.”

“Those are the ones I like to take down,” Will said. “I’d love to know where the lawyer was over the past twelve hours.”

“You think this Kenneth Buchanan is really the one?”

“I don’t know,” Will said. “He had a connection to Kristen. A motive, too, if he was jealous of her other lovers. A crime of passion, however twisted. But maybe the asshole is really a psychopath? So he kills the girls up at Oxford for the fun of it and then has this guy for dessert.”

Will drifted into thinking again about John, about his stepson’s visit earlier in the week, and about the shoeprint found on Kristen’s boat.

Dodds said, “You don’t like his ass because he reminds you of Cindy’s new husband. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to send a lawyer to the express lane at death row. But we’re going to need more before command will let us lean on him.”

“We can still ViCAP his ass,” Will said, referring to the FBI’s colossal Violent Criminal Apprehension Program database. “He came here with his wife from Atlanta. It will be interesting to see if they have some unsolved homicides with this kind of mutilation.”

Five days, four victims. Will said, “Now we know they were all tied together, but we still don’t know how or why he chose them. Kristen’s a cop on national television. The two vics at Miami were nobodies. Same with this guy. Not only did they have different hair colors and body types, they were different genders. Did you know Cheryl Beth was one of the instructors of those dead students? And Smith asked her to come out and talk to him at the Butler County jail?”

“No shit?” Dodds’ back was to him, as he closely examined the body. “So how was your date?”

“It was nice.”

“How many positions? What does she look like naked? Tell an old married man everything so I can live vicariously.”

Will felt his face flush. “We had dinner and beers and talked. It was nice.”

Dodds simply shook his head.

A uni brought up a middle-aged man who had found the body an hour before. He was a gardener. They went through the usual: Did you touch anything? Was anyone else nearby when you found the body? Was anything amiss elsewhere on the grounds? They got nowhere.

“If I found some guy with his penis stuck in his mouth, I’d run like hell and call the cops, too,” Will said.

“Shit, it’s beautiful here,” Dodds said, snapping off his gloves, rolling them inside each other, and sticking them in his pocket. It was an understatement. A person could spend days wandering the lanes, taking in all the architecture driven by grief and vanity, reading the history carved in stone, and loving the nature. “All these important dead white people, and I’m-a walkin’ on ‘em.” He laughed, but not loud enough to attract attention.

“I keep going back to the note,” Will said. “He addressed it to me. How did he know I was investigating this case? That information isn’t out there.”

“Again,” Dodds said, “could be a cop and maybe somebody we know. Who else knew you were investigating Gruber?”

“Buchanan,” Will said. “Otherwise, I don’t know. I was on the other side of the levee when they brought Gruber’s body up. There was a little group watching, looked like locals.”

“So how do you want to play it?”

Will cocked his head.

“I thought I was the PIO again.”

“Quit feeling sorry for yourself. I need your brain here, partner. This guy’s obviously into himself.”

It was an understatement. He wanted all of Cincinnati to know that a dangerous murderer was loose, somebody who had made fools of the cops, and had gotten away with it.

“We could report minimal information,” Will said. “Unidentified body found in Spring Grove Cemetery. Cheryl Beth said Smith didn’t have any relatives. So no relatives are going to be interviewed on television. We can order the gardener to shut up. This killer wants to be famous. He wants everybody peeing in their pants wondering where his next ‘art show’ will be. Notice how he types and prints out this note, then puts it in a plastic cover, in case it rains. He wants attention. We could take it even further and say we don’t know whether it’s a suicide or a homicide, or even the cause of death. That’d mind-fuck this master criminal back.”

“I like it,” Dodds said. “The only problem is, he might be tempted to send the note to the newspaper. Hell, he might be tempted to try another killing.”

“So?” Will said. “He addressed the note to me. Who do you think his next victim would be?”

Dodds studied him and raised his eyebrows. “I hope to god you sleep with Cheryl Beth before he cuts your dick off.”

Cheryl Beth was finishing up the post-shift conferences with her students when she saw Will walking down the hall. He looked handsome, but he was holding one shoulder too high, and his face looked exhausted. She complimented him on how he looked in his suit.

“Can we go somewhere?”

“Yes.” She steered him into a family waiting room that was remarkably empty and they sat down.

“What happened?” She took his hands. They were well-shaped and warm, but had fresh abrasions.

“I fell last night.” He smiled. “You swept me off my feet.”

“Are you hurting?”

He shook his head. “Cheryl Beth, Noah Smith is dead.”

Somewhere deep inside she had somehow been expecting this news. Still, it felt as if the end of a baseball bat had been driven into her stomach. “Oh, no. Suicide?”

“No. He was killed like the others.”

“What?”

As he gave her the details, she was first slightly nauseous, then frightened. She was good at controlling herself, but she knew this showed all over her face. She could hear her mother’s voice: “You’re an open book, Cheryl Beth.”

“And he left you a note?”

“It was addressed specifically to me,” he said. “Otherwise, they were going to take me off the case. Goddamned cripple.” His face was a mask of disgust.

“Stop that. You’re not a cripple. You only walk with a cane. It adds character. I think you’re very attractive.”

He let himself smile. “That’s funny, because I think you are, too.” After a pause: “I used to be good at flirting, but I’m way out of practice.”

She patted his arm. “You’re doing well, detective. I don’t understand how this could happen. I saw Noah in the bookstore yesterday. He actually tracked me down. Kind of surprised me, but he seemed desperate for someone to believe him. He thought Hank Brooks was following him.”

“Oh, hell,” Will said. “Give me a minute.” He pulled out his cell phone and had a brief conversation-with Brooks, it was soon evident. After he hung up, he said, “I hate these multi-jurisdictional cases. I forgot to tell him about Smith’s body being found. Now he claims he never really thought Noah did it. And he denied following him.”

“But Noah was certain he was being followed,” Cheryl Beth said.

“Maybe by the killer.”

The chill returned to her bloodstream. “The killer who writes to you personally. Oh, Will…”

“I want to show you some photographs,” he said. “Let me know if any of them are familiar. Anybody you’ve seen hanging around campus or the hospital. Anybody who might have seen these three students.”

She ran through ten photographs and none looked familiar. One was a bald man, although he looked distinguished in a suit and tie. She went one by one again, trying to remember. She finally shook her head.