Jonathan Kellerman - Monster

Milo snarfed more pretzels. Someone shouted for a Bud. The bartender, a black-haired Croatian with four rings in his left ear, palmed the tap. We were drinking single-malt scotch. Eighteen-year-old Macallan. When Milo asked for the bottle, the Croatian's eyebrows lifted. He smiled as he poured.

"What the hell was it all for?" said Milo.

"That's a real question?"

"Yeah, I've used up my ration of rhetorical."

I was sorry he asked. I'd thought about little else, had answers good enough for talk shows but nothing real.

Milo put his glass down, stared at me.

"Maybe it was all for fun," I said. "Or preparation for the movie Crimmins convinced himself he'd write one day. Or he was actually going to sell the tapes."

"We still haven't found any underground market for that kind of crap."

"Okay." I sipped. "So eliminate that."

"I know," he said. "There's an appetite for every damn bit of garbage out there. I'm just saying nothing's turned up linking Crimmins to any snuff-film business deals, and we've looked big-time. No cash hoard, not a single bank account, no meetings with any shifty types in long coats, no ads in weirdo magazines. And the computer Crimmins had in the house wasn't hooked up to the Internet. Nothing but basic software, no files. Our guy says he probably never used it."

"Technologically impaired," I said. "No sweat. Video's as good as film."

"All I'm saying is it doesn't look like he was after the money. Stole all that gear but never tried to sell it. We figure he was probably living off dope sales."

"And Heidi's salary," I said. "Till she became superfluous. No bank accounts means the two of them spent everything as it came in. They weren't living like royalty and they avoided paying rent, so a good deal of it probably went up her nose."

"His, too. Coroner found some coke in his system. A little meth, too. And something called loratadine."

"Antihistamine," I said. "Doesn't make you drowsy. Maybe Crimmins was allergic to the desert, needed to keep his energy level up for the big shoot."

Milo refilled his glass. "Blood Walk."

"Whatever his specific motivation," I said, "and he may have had several, in his head it was a major production. It was the process he loved. He got hooked on playing God sixteen years ago."

He downed the scotch. "You really think Crimmins did the Ardullos by himself."

"By himself or with his brother. But not with Peake. Peake was set up. I'll probably never be able to prove it, but the facts support it. Think about Peake's blood test: just a residue of Thorazine. Heidi'd been weaning him off his meds for a while. Just as Claire probably had. But Claire's motive was to get Peake to talk about his crimes. And, unconsciously, she wanted to find some virtue in his soul because that might say something about her brother. Heidi wanted Peake sufficiently coherent so he could cooperate in the escape and-more important-perform on film. Killing Marvelle and Suzy on camera-the Monster finally reveals itself. But it didn't work. He didn't perform. You saw his condition. With or without Thorazine, he's extremely low-functioning, has been for years. At his prime, he had no more than a borderline IQ. Adolescent paint- and glue-sniffing and alcohol knocked off a few more points. Thorazine and tardive dyskinesia numbed him further. He was never in any shape to plan and conduct a crime spree, even the disorganized massacre Jacob Haas found at the Ardullo house. He had nothing to do with Heidi's death or Frank Dollard's. No motive, no means. Same for the Ardullos."

"The Ardullos were your basic senseless crime," he said. "Maniac on the loose, no need for a motive."

"That's what Derrick wanted everyone to think," I said.

"And he got his way. But there's always some kind of motive. Psychotic or otherwise. Peake's no criminal superman, just pathetic. Derrick plotted it all out. Good against evil; Derrick gives, Derrick takes away."

Another drink poured. Milo said, "Daredevil Avenger."

"On some level, Derrick probably started believing his own P.R. Peake as surrogate monster, Derrick as angel of deliverance. But Peake just doesn't fit any type of psychotic killer. He's never shown any indication of a delusional system, bloody or otherwise, never acted violently before the massacre or since. He's a retarded man with advanced schizophrenia, organic brain damage, alcoholic dementia. Crimmins called him a meat puppet and that's exactly what he was, right from the beginning. Derrick and Cliff got him drunk, borrowed his shoes they were able to even though they were much taller, because Peake's feet are disproportionately large. One or both of them walked through the Ardullo house slashing and bludgeoning. Two killers would have made it easier, quicker. The sneaker prints pointed to Peake and led to his shack. With that kind of proof, why bother looking any further? And don't forget who was in charge: Haas, a part-time cop, absolutely no homicide experience. Then the FBI came in and did an after-the-fact profile."

Milo had two more shots.

"One other thing," I said. "That night, when Peake had his hand taped to the gun, he was experiencing plenty of tardive symptoms. Lots of movement; you'd think he would've pulled the trigger just by chance. But he didn't. And I swear there were times, looking at him, that he seemed to be resisting. Forcing himself to hold back."

He pushed his drink away. Swiveled on his stool and stared.

"He's a hero now?"

"Make of it what you will."

Another shot. He said, "So what are you going to do about it?"

"What can I do? Like you said, no proof. And one way or the other, Peake's going to need confinement. I suppose Starkweather's as good a place as any."

"Starkweather in the post-Swig era," he said. "I heard his uncle found him a job on someone else's staff."

"Swig was a mediocre man trying to do a wizard's job. There're no easy solutions."

"So Peake stays put."

"Peake stays put."

"You're okay with that."

"Do I have a choice?" I said. "Let's say I do raise a stink, somehow manage to free him. Some do-gooder will see that he gets out on the street, which'll turn him into just another homeless wretch. He can't take care of himself. He'd be dead in a week."

"So we're putting him away for his own good."

"Yes," I said, surprised at the harshness in my voice. "Who the hell said life was fair?" He stared at me again.

"That day in his room," I said, "when I talked to Peake about the Ardullo children and he began to cry, I misjudged him. I thought it was all self-pity. But he was feeling real pain. Not just at being blamed for it. At what happened. Maybe he revealed some of that to Claire, and that's what kept her going with him. Or maybe she never saw it. But it was real, I'm sure of it. Right after that is when he jumped up, assumed the Jesus pose. He was telling me he'd been martyred. Suffered for someone else's sins. Not sorry for himself. At peace with it."

"Telling you," he said. "Severely low-functioning, but he's worth listening to?"

"Oh, yeah," I said. "It always pays to listen." We sat in silence for a long time. Someone else replaced Jimmy Buffett, but I couldn't tell you who.

I threw money on the bar. "Let's get out of here." He lifted himself with effort. "You going to see him again?"

"Probably," I said.

Jonathan Kellerman is one of the world's most popular authors. He has brought his expertise as a child psychologist to numerous bestselling tales of suspense (which have been translated into two dozen languages), including thirteen previous Alex Delaware novels; The Butcher's Theater, a story of serial killing in Jerusalem; and Billy Straight, featuring Hollywood homicide detective Petra Connor. His new novel, Flesh and Blood, will be published in hardcover in fall 2001. He is also the author of numerous essays, short stories, and scientific articles, two children's books, and three volumes of psychology, including Savage Spawn: Reflections on Violent Children. He and his wife, the novelist Faye Kellerman, have four children.