J. Bertrand - Pattern of Wounds

“Again, no comment.”

“Is it the new case? There’s some kind of connection?”

I must be transparent as glass. The way he locks on to the truth so fast catches me off guard. I take the book from him and open it up to the photo section.

“You see this? Hold that for me.”

I shouldn’t do this. I know I shouldn’t. But I dig out my camera and scroll through the photos snapped at last night’s scene, landing on the one.

“Now, look at those side by side and tell me what you think.”

With the book in one hand and the camera in the other, he goes back and forth for a while, taking the comparison seriously. The waitress returns with my coffee and he doesn’t spare her a glance. He puts them both down on the table.

“This is legit?”

“Yes,” I say, leaning forward, not even trying to contain my excitement. “You see it, too.”

He nods slowly. “It’s a little creepy.”

“But there is a resemblance.”

“Definitely.”

“If you were me, you’d have a hard time believing that the perpetrator of the one crime had never seen the photo from the other, right? He has to have seen it and fixated on it, too, incorporated it into his fantasy. Because this didn’t happen by accident. He arranged everything to look a certain way. It’s not an exact copy, but if you ask me”-I tap my finger on the book-“this had to be his inspiration.”

His eyebrows wrinkle up. “And it just so happens you’re assigned the case? The same detective who investigated the original?”

“That part’s a coincidence,” I say.

“Which you don’t believe in, right? There’s a quote from you about that in here. Everything’s related. Nothing’s coincidental.”

The coffee tastes burnt, but I drink it anyway. Talking to Templeton can be frustrating, which is why I avoid doing it. He’s been strangely possessive of me for a long time, confusing the real life person with the character in his book. It doesn’t help that I’ve made liberal use of him, not just as a source of information but to do back-channel legwork. Thanks to his celebrated run at the now-defunct Houston Post and his voracious appetite for gossip, he knows everyone and knows everything about everyone.

“Listen to me, Brad. The woman who was murdered yesterday was young and carefree. Maybe irresponsible, but who wasn’t at that age? She was full of life. Her mother said all she wanted was to be happy, and instead she’s on a slab at the morgue waiting to be cut open some more. Now I need a way to link the man who did this to the scene. You can help with that, but you’re going to have to take this seriously.”

“I do take it seriously.”

“What I’m saying is, I need you to go back through any letters or emails or any kind of communication you’ve gotten, and make sure there’s nothing out of the ordinary.”

“Give me a name,” he says.

“What?”

“You have a suspect, so give me his name. That’ll make it easy.”

“I can’t give you a name, you know that.” I cut him off before he can object. “But I can tell you this. The victim’s name is Simone Walker, but her married name was Young. Because the guy she married, his name is Jason Young.”

“Jason Young,” he says.

“That’s the name of the husband.”

“Ah.” He reaches inside his jacket for a pen, then writes the name on a napkin, stuffing it away as the food arrives. “You’re not eating?”

“I don’t have the appetite. I’m heading to the ME’s office after this.”

“Better safe than sorry,” he says, digging in.

Between bites, he catches me up on his latest project, a book about Dean Corll, the notorious Candy Man serial killer from the early seventies, who terrorized the Heights neighborhood where I grew up, not so far from where Charlotte and I live now. Back then it was just as diverse ethnically, but more working class. Corll’s victims, mostly teenage boys, didn’t go unnoticed, but the police were all too quick to write them off as runaways.

The city’s seedy underbelly has always been one of Templeton’s obsessions. His first book, which I’ve never read, was about a Houston real estate mogul from the late forties who was found hanging from the rafters in his stable. It would’ve passed for a suicide except that the man’s mistress had been strung up, too. During the interviews he did for The Kingwood Killing , he talked a lot about Dean Corll, so I’m not surprised he’d gone back to the story. Recent events may have contributed.

“They’ve found another one of his victims,” Templeton says, using his fork to punctuate. “One of the bodies, I mean.”

“I’m aware of that.”

“So I was thinking maybe it was time to revisit that case. Tell the story from a fresh perspective. I’ve always been interested in Corll, you know that.”

“The serial killer thing leaves me cold,” I say.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It just does. The whole cultural fixation. There are so many books written about these people that they’re practically celebrities. They’re the ones you’re making famous, not me. It’s no wonder you have imitators, the way the pathology’s been glamorized.”

“That’s so naive,” he says. “The next thing you’re gonna tell me is that listening to gangsta rap turns good suburban kids into stone-cold thugs. It’s ridiculous. You can’t blame writers for turning people into serial killers-and anyway, I don’t think it’s possible to glamorize a man who tortured and murdered young boys.”

“You’re right,” I say. “Maybe you should write about him. It’ll keep you out of my hair, for one thing. I was just a kid when it all happened. Unless you’re looking for some insight into what it was like in the Heights for an eleven-year-old.”

“I actually would be interested in that,” he says.

“It wasn’t like anything. We had no idea what was going on. I certainly didn’t. Compared to now, we were sheltered.”

He puts his fork down and starts chuckling. “Sheltered in the seventies? Drugs and the Sexual Revolution? Disco? Where were you, man?”

“I was eleven. And disco came later, anyway.”

His smile fades. “But you’re not being honest with me, March. All the time we’ve known each other you’ve been holding back. You knew I was into the Corll thing, and you never said a word. I can hardly believe it-but then, it’s you we’re talking about.”

“You know what? I’ve got to get going.”

“Not so fast. I’m helping you with your investigation, so you have to help with mine.”

“I don’t have any help to give, remember? I didn’t work that case.”

“March,” he says. “I’ve been talking to your cousin.”

“My cousin ?”

“Tammy Putnam. You know who I mean. She runs a website devoted to the victims of Dean Corll, including her brother Moody. Now, I knew about the site, but I didn’t know until I actually interviewed her that the two of you are family. She says you and Moody were inseparable.”

“Brad, listen to me-”

“She also says you’ve essentially kicked her out of your life, and this is why.”

If I hadn’t been up all night, if I wasn’t operating on a diet of black coffee and the bagel Aguilar fed me four and a half hours ago, I could handle this bombshell a little better. But I have, and I am, so I handle it by slamming my mug on the table, sloshing the last of my coffee onto the last of his fish and chips. He scoots back in a rush, but his eyes alight with glee.

“A palpable hit,” he says. “Now fair is fair. I want to know the truth about your cousin’s theory. She says Moody knew Dean Corll’s friends, was definitely taken by him, and that you know it too, but refuse to admit it.”