James Knapp - State of Decay

Why the mother? I thought. Why not concentrate on the father, the one most likely to be a problem?

Maybe it was to make him talk.

Then why not the kid?

Maybe he has half a heart.

No one with a functioning heart did this.

“So she was tortured; then all three were killed.”

“Other way around,” the investigator said. “Blood patterns indicate the father and daughter were killed first, and then he went to work on the mother.”

She was the key , the voice nagged.

Whatever he was searching for, he thought she had it or knew where it was. He killed the others in front of her. When she still didn’t talk, he tried to torture it out of her …

…but she didn’t know.

“I saw footprints at the door,” I said. The investigator nodded.

“Yes, but I’m not sure they belong to the killer.”

“You matched them to the family?”

“No, but we were able to get an approximate shoe size from impressions in the carpet,” she said. “The placement makes them the killer’s. They don’t match either of the sets of prints at the door, and neither do any of the victims.”

“So someone else was in here?”

“Yes.”

“Before or after the murders?”

“I can’t say for sure, but I think after.”

“Why?”

“The boot tracks left traces leading to and from the bathroom, and that’s it. Whoever they belong to didn’t go any farther into the apartment. The sneaker prints do, but only as far as this room. They were faint, but it looks like whoever they belong to came down the hall, through the living room to this room, stood in the doorway, then turned around and walked back the way he came.”

“Then they should be on the building’s security cameras.”

“That’s the other weird part,” she said. “The logs on the cameras had been tampered with.”

“Tampered with how?”

“The system was breached remotely. A section had been wiped out, but the strange thing is, I don’t think it was the killer trying to cover his tracks. The time of death puts his arrival hours before the section that was missing.”

“So what was he trying to cover up?”

“I’m not sure it was the killer at all.”

“The two who came in after?” I asked, and she shrugged.

“It fits, time-wise.”

Maybe for some reason the visitors who came after the murders—the pair of sneakers that found the bodies and the friend with the boots who used the john—didn’t want anyone to know they had been there. Whoever they were, they didn’t call the murders in.

“You said the killer didn’t force his way in,” I said. “Who kicked the door?”

“The tenant next door,” Reece said, nodding toward the man in the sweater. “He said he got a call for help from the father, but it was over by the time he got in. He didn’t see a thing.”

“A phone call would have been a neat trick, tied up like that. Do you believe his account?”

“I think he believes it, but again, it doesn’t fit. We pulled the call records, and the call he got came after the section of missing security tape was erased. We traced it to a public phone, paid for with a drugstore phone card.”

“It was a tip,” I said. Someone wanted the bodies found, without having to come forward.

A witness , the voice inside said. That’s promising.

The witness didn’t see anything.

He talked to whoever made that call. You should go talk to him. Have Shanks look around the apartment while you do it.

I sighed, my face suddenly flushed, and straightened my jacket. Maybe it did pay to listen to your gut, to trust your intuition. Things could hardly go much worse.

“Shanks, check around. I want to talk to him.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

The man in the sweater looked visibly disturbed when I approached him, although I didn’t see any blood on him and there wasn’t any sign he’d been attacked. I waved the officers away and knelt with him.

“What’s your name?” I asked him. His eyes darted over to me.

“Roger. Roger Hammond.”

“Bad night, huh?”

He nodded.

“Did you know the victims?”

“Yes. I mean, as neighbors.”

“That’s pretty brave, breaking in here like that.”

He shrugged.

“Did you witness the attack?”

“No. They were already dead by the time I got inside.”

“You said you got a call from the victim?”

He nodded.

“When he called, what did he say?”

“He was whispering. He said, ‘It’s Miguel Valle. Someone’s in the apartment …they killed them.’ Then the line cut out.”

“Why would he call you? Why not the police?”

He shook his head back and forth slightly, staring at the floor.

“It wasn’t him. I know it wasn’t him.”

“Who do you think it was?” I asked.

“I don’t know. Someone who wanted me to find them.”

“You gonna be all right?”

“Yeah. Were all four of them dead?”

“Three.”

“There’s four,” he said. “Miguel, Becca, Kate, and Luis.”

“Luis?”

“His son.”

“How old is he?”

“Luis? Maybe nineteen or twenty.”

The second set of footprints. The son, and someone else …a friend? He was gone for whatever reason when the killer entered the apartment, and came back after the fact. He found the bodies, and he ran.

“Thanks, Mr. Hammond. That helps.”

Shanks was heading back into the room from down the hall, and I rejoined him and Reece.

“Your guys searched the place room to room when you got here?” I asked Reece.

“Yeah,” he said, making a face. “Whatever your guy was looking for, either he found it or it wasn’t here.”

“Fair enough. It looks like the Valles also had a son, Luis Valle, who may still be alive. We need an APB out on him immediately.”

“I’m on it.”

Reece stalked off to rejoin the others when I knelt down with Shanks.

“You think the kid had something to do with this?” Shanks asked.

“I don’t know.”

Maybe …maybe. The thought nagged at me. But maybe he’s what the killer was looking for….

“Maybe he’s not running from us,” I said.

We need him alive.

“We need him alive.”

“If he’s alive, they’ll find him,” he said.

“You dig anything else up?”

“Yeah. It looks like someone was on the computer when the attack occurred. You’ll want to see this.”

He led me down the main hallway to a room at the far end that was dark except for the illumination from the computer screen. The chair in front of it had been pushed back, leaving trails in the carpet.

“They didn’t find any prints but the family’s,” Shanks said, “but look what I found on the system.”

A little instant message window was sitting in the corner of the screen. There were entries still sitting on it.

“One of them was talking to someone,” I said. One of the names read RVALLE0107. “Rebecca Valle. The mother.”

“The killer must have shut it down, but didn’t exit out completely. He probably thought he got rid of it.”

Leaning closer, I read the tiny text on the screen.

CRAIGH01: Where is it now? RVALLE0107: With him, I think. CRAIGH01: Good. RVALLE0107: Cross was detected, though. CRAIGH01: Yes. RVALLE0107: Hold on a minute. CRAIGH01: What’s the matter? RVALLE0107: Hold on. RVALLE0107: Sorry, we have a visitor. I’ll get back to you. CRAIGH01: Who is this? CRAIGH01: Who is this? RVALLE0107: I have to get back to you. CRAIGH01: What have you done to them? CRAIGH01: Why are you doing this? CRAIGH01: Why are you doing this to us? RVALLE0107: Because someone has to.