Gregg Olsen - Fear Collector

My Peggy,

Daphne and Liz were never anything to me. At least not to the degree that some of my detractors and the leeches who make money off my name will have the masses believe. I was young, a college student. I wasn’t in love. I didn’t get dumped by either of those girls. Stephanie, in particular, has slung some mud in my direction, but I’m not a game player. I won’t even give her the dignity of a reply. When she’s talking about someone who is immature and directionless, she’s talking about herself. Whatever you have read about the influence these women had on my life is so totally overstated as to border on the absurd. I’m laughing to myself right now as I write this. Peg, you have been everything to me. You have stood by me. That’s love. That’s what keeps me going. In you, my legacy will continue. You are a great gift. peace, Ted

In 1973, Ted was accepted into the law schools of the University of Puget Sound and the University of Utah. It wasn’t his grades that got him there, but the letters of recommendation from Republican Party leaders in Washington, the foremost of which was Governor Dan Evans. Ted earned Evans’s accolades by way of his support during the governor’s reelection campaign. His support was either clever or devious depending on whether one wore a donkey or an elephant on his or her lapel.

Ted, masquerading as a college student, followed Evans’s democratic opponent throughout the campaign of 1972, recording speeches from the inside and passing them along to the state Republican offices. He was ingratiating. Smart. Always there when he needed be. There were times when staffers would find themselves next to him, as if he were some kind of phantom who came and went on footsteps that made no sound.

Peggy Howell never felt more disappointed than when Jeremy failed his LSATs, precluding him from following his father’s path to law school. Her blood simmered whenever she recalled the day she’d beaten him to the mailbox and found the rejection letter, in its starchy crisp envelope. It was a knife in the back, a betrayal that only served to make her seethe with disappointment and rage.

Though years had passed, every now and then it all resurfaced and she’d pull a bloody tipped arrow from her quiver and aim it at him.

“You’re nothing but a telemarketer! A goddamn annoyance to everyone who has the misfortune of picking up the phone when you call with some piece of crap that you want them to buy! Sometimes I go to bed at night and thank God that your father never had to see the man you’ve become. It makes me sick. Your dad was a lawyer! You’re supposed to do better than your father, not worse!”

Jeremy knew enough about his father and he also knew that to challenge his mother was a mistake he would never make more than once. He could have stopped her right there and told her the truth.

Ted Bundy never got his JD! He had too many distractions in the form of pretty young brunettes, Mom! Pretty ones! Not like you, Mom!

And yet he held his tongue, tight like it was ensnared in a woodworker’s vise. To challenge her was too, too dangerous.

“You are the prettiest by far,” he said.

His words came at Emma like poisoned darts. He’d barely said anything up to that point, and now, when he did she wished he hadn’t. She knew that horror movies were often considered more frightening because of what they didn’t show. The unknown was always scarier than something visible in the light of day. Once the shark in the old movie Jaws was actually shown on screen, his menace palled. It didn’t matter that he was snacking on an old sea captain or half-naked swimmer. It was scarier when his presence was hidden under the inky confines of the sea.

Emma’s captor no longer wanted to be as anonymous as he had been from the minute that he took her. And the choice of his words in that first real utterance made his intentions all too clear.

Emma broke it all down.

“The prettiest” indicated that there was a component in his aberrant behavior that encompassed her physical beauty. He was attracted to her. That part was easy enough to decipher. He’d given her a brush and mirror. He wanted her to look a specific way.

“By far” was also telling and perhaps the most frightening thing she’d ever heard directed at her in her life. It seemed clear to Emma right then in the dim light of the room that she had not been the first. There had been other girls.

In the apartment?

And if so, where were they now?

“Thank you,” she said to the man on the other side of the room. She did so because of her mother’s advice for dealing with a school bully one time.

“Kill him with kindness,” her mom had said. “I know it seems lame, but I know for a fact that it works every time.”

“You’re welcome, Emma Rose,” the man said.

She stiffened at the use of her full name. He’d never really called her by name, at least that she could be certain about. She searched the darkness, trying to see him. To see what it was that he wanted.

“Why don’t you come out of the darkness and talk to me?” she asked, still a little frightened about what the perv might look like. Old, nasty, wrinkly, fat, and smelly. She knew Beauty and the Beast from the ice show that her mom took her to in Tacoma.

She also knew the Silence of the Lambs.

Both scenarios ratcheted up the fear and disgust that swelled inside her whenever she felt the air move in the apartment.

“Later,” he said.

“When is later? It isn’t like I have a lot to do here but read these stupid magazines.”

“When I’m ready. When you are ready. I promise. You are the prettiest by far.”

Emma saw the shadow move and she moved toward it. But it was too late. The door shut and the dead bolt fell like a thunderclap.

A mong the data collected from Emma Rose’s laptop were the usual musings of a teenage girl. She had a blog-with only one entry. She had a Facebook account with a respectable two hundred friends, most of whom she actually knew. She had a Twitter account, but used it only for following various affinity groups.

Grace looked at the report provided by the forensic computer specialist, Darian Hecla, a brainy twenty-five-year-old who many thought should be writing code instead of cracking it. There was a little truth to that, but circumstances had sent him to law enforcement, a job he actually liked. His personnel file had been sealed so that even the nosiest records clerk couldn’t get his or her prying eyes on it, but Darian was working there as a part of a plea agreement. When he was twenty, he’d hacked into the office of the governor and read things that would have been extremely embarrassing for her. The secret plea deal was the best solution for everyone.

Darian went through Emma’s laptop, leaving no one or zero unturned.

Hunched over the printout, Grace used a yellow highlighter to mark what she thought might bring the investigation closer to a resolution. To her way of thinking, the only resolution would be bringing Emma home.

Alive.

“Anything interesting?” Paul asked as he looked over her shoulder.

Grace looked up. “I think so,” she said taking the yellow marker and rubbing its tip through a passage in the report. “Read this.”

Laptop owner had three primary interests, at least two of which intersected. She routinely re-tweeted Tweets posted by @SafeSound and@Envi_Live. Both are local environmental action organizations based in the Pacific Northwest. Both promote clean Puget Sound water.

“We all like clean water, Grace,” Paul said, lifting his eyes from the report.

Grace made a face. “Read on, please.” She tapped her fingertip to the next paragraph, one she’d also highlighted.