Herb and I took turns, relating what we had so far, and what we were going after.
'So the women are connected,' Bains said when we finished.
'We think so. Maybe not to each other, but definitely to our perp. He's not grabbing women of a certain type, he's grabbing women he knows and wants to punish. If we can find the link, perhaps we find him.'
'In his note, he refers to the fourth. The Feds think it's the fourth of next month.'
'Could be,' I said. 'Or it could be the fourth victim.'
The phone rang. The chief picked it up, listened, and held out the phone for me.
'Daniels.'
'This is Briggs, front desk. Don't want to bust your chops in front of the boss, but we've got a guy on hold says something happened to your mom.'
Panic exploded within me. 'Put him through.'
'Jack? Guess who.'
I gave a quick nod to Bains and mouthed 'It's him.' He picked up his cell phone and gave word to trace.
'What's happened to my mother?'
'Just blowing smoke, Jack, so they'd put me through to you. But I did leave you something, in the alley behind your building. A picnic lunch. Enjoy it. See you soon.'
The line went dead.
'He's off,' I said.
'Pay phone on Michigan,' Bains said. The days of long traces were in the past. The modern phone trace was practically instantaneous.
I relayed the conversation word for word, Benedict writing it all down. A minute later the chief's cell phone rang.
'They missed him,' he told us. 'Blended into the rush hour crowd.'
'Let's go check the alley,' Benedict said.
Bains came with us. We didn't bother to stop for coats.
The district building was on a street corner, and on the third side was the parking lot. The alley wasn't an official alley; just an enclave where the Dumpsters were kept. We approached it cautiously, eyes scanning everything. Since we both outranked Herb, he did the honors of rooting through the garbage.
'Looks like a cooler,' he said, moving some bags. 'Big one.'
Bains gave the go-ahead to open it. Herb lifted the corner, holding the edge with a handkerchief.
'Christ.'
It was bad. Real bad. This had surpassed murder and become butchery.
'Let's rope it off, get a team in here.' Bains shook his head. The third body being found right behind his police station wouldn't help his career.
I left the scene, placing a phone call to Mom, just to make sure she was safe. Then I sat on the steps in front of the district building, still without a jacket, letting the cold be my penance.
I'd let another person die.
The team came, and the reporters, and a crowd of gawkers.
I thought about my job, and my mom, and my insomnia, and my date that afternoon, and Don.
I thought about Benedict, and Phineas Troutt, and Harry McGlade, and my past, and my ex-husband, and the dog I had when I was a kid that we had to put to sleep because he broke his leg chasing a rabbit.
I thought about the stars in the sky. I hadn't seen the stars in years. The smog in Chicago was thick enough to blot them out. For all I knew, they weren't there anymore.
I wondered what the point was. No one was happy. Every day brings some new annoyance, some new problem, some new pain. And if you managed to avoid cancer, and AIDS, and drugs, and car accidents, and malevolent acts of God, there was still the chance that some wacko would grab you, or your kid, and torture them to death for no reason.
I tried to remember the last time I laughed so hard it hurt. I tried to recall a day where I went to bed happy.
I couldn't.
Special Agents Dailey and Coursey, in matching black trench coats, materialized from the crowd and walked briskly up to me. They moved in step, left foot, right foot, as if they were doing a Wrigley's Doublemint commercial. I didn't hide my disappointment when they stopped in front of my stoop.
'We hope there's no hard feelings,' Dailey said.
I gave him a blank look.
'That you're off the case. We know what it's like, and we'll do our best to keep you in the loop.'
How about that? An olive branch.
'In return, we'd like to use some of your men.'
