When I was halfway to the destination in Pilsen, my phone rang again. It was Casey. “What else have you got?”
“We never looked at Robbie. Of all the people we investigated, we never looked at Robbie.” Casey sounded exasperated. “I’m looking at his social media profiles now. He’s put a few posts up about his father. It looks like his biological father died when he was young… and you’re not going to like this—his lawyer stepdad was accused of sexual abuse, at least that’s what he posted about five years ago.”
“Of whom?”
“I haven’t got that information yet, but what I can find at the moment, says that the stepdad escaped any charges.” Casey said. “He posted that his stepdad was charged with sexual abuse, but the prosecution lost the case in court. I’m trying to find more information about this now.”
“That’s what must’ve triggered Robbie.” I tapped my finger against the steering wheel as I waited at a set of traffic lights. “That’s what must’ve driven his hatred for defense lawyers.”
“And when Jonathon DiMarco came along, he added the fuel to the fire.” Casey said. “Wait. Robbie said that he ran a number of websites. You don’t think he runs D-TAL?”
“Is there a way to check?”
Casey went silent as she typed furiously on her keyboard. I could hear the keys tapping at a fast rhythm. “I can’t access the name of who registered the website domain name… it’s been suppressed. You’ve got to pay for a website domain name to be suppressed. Wait. I’ve got a forwarding address for the website. Oh.”
“What is it?”
“The address the owner has listed for the website is South Miller St, Pilsen.”
“Robbie’s address.” I grunted. “How did we not see that?”
“I looked, but the owner’s name was suppressed.” Casey said. “How are you going to play this, Jack? Are you going to go in guns blazing?”
“Robbie’s clever. A lot smarter than we gave him credit for.” I roared the engine to life when the lights turned green. I gripped the door of the truck, screeching around another corner. “But I still don’t have any evidence. I need him to trip up with something.” The thoughts rolled around in my head. “I’ll talk to him and I’ll have my phone recording. If he’s going to say anything, we’ll have it recorded to the cloud.”
“Jack, you should wait,” Casey pleaded. “Give the information to Detective Williams. Let them chase Robbie. This guy is a serial killer. You have to wait. Don’t go in there alone.”
“No chance.” I sped around another corner.
“At least wait for me,” Casey complained. “I’m fine now. I can help.”
“No way. You need to rest,” I said. “And Williams already said that he wasn’t going to touch it. If I’m going to nail this killer, I need to do it myself. I need Robbie to confess.”
Chapter 30
I parked on South Miller St, five doors down from the apartment, next to a sedan I’d seen in the Five-Five’s parking lot a few days earlier. It had to be Robbie’s old red Chevy sedan. The beaten-up car was the only one in the parking lot of the Five-Five older than a few years. I checked in the windows. There was nothing of note—an old sweater, a McDonald’s wrapper, and a well-used football. I looked up and down the street and then checked the doors. They were locked.
The streetlights provided small patches of brightness outside a row of Chicago Two-Flat townhouses. Almost twenty-five percent of Chicago’s housing, ‘Two-Flats’ were a Chicago-style townhouse, comprised of three stories—a unit on each floor and a basement—with bay windows facing the street through a facade of brick or Indiana greystone. The row of houses was detached, and the pride that some people took in them was obvious. They each had their own personality—some had children’s bikes in the front yard, others had rows of flowers, and some had the American Flag hanging out front. Robbie’s townhouse was the worst on the street—an overgrown yard, a wire fence that was falling apart, and a paint job that was fifteen years past its use-by date.
I was going to play it dumb with Robbie, feed into his ego, and let him think that I was still going after DiMarco. That was the plan, at least.
I turned on the recording device on my phone, relaying the recordings directly to the cloud, and found the stairs that led down to the basement door, treading carefully as there seemed to be a broken globe in the porch light. There were weeds on the stairs, an empty beer can next to the door, and mold growing underneath the window next to the entrance. It was dark, but I think that was the way Robbie preferred it. I knocked on the door and then heard heavy footsteps making their way towards me. The door opened wide, and Robbie was standing there, dressed in jeans and an old Bears jersey.
“Jack Valentine?” he questioned. “How did you find my address?”
“Come on, Robbie, I’m an investigator. I’ve got the know-how to find anyone.” I opened my hands wide and laughed. Robbie smiled. That was good. “I need your help. I think we’re close with Jonathon DiMarco and I need your expertise.”
“DiMarco?” he questioned.
“You know how you said you wanted some experience in investigation? Well, this is your chance to
