her mom bought them from the factory in three-gallon tins.
They unwrapped the sandwiches-both topped with a big dill pickle spear-and began to eat.
“Canvas turn up anything?” M.C. asked around a bite of the greasy Reuben.
“Nada. Not even a dog barking.” Kitt washed the sandwich down with a sip of water. “This guy chooses a residential, out-of-the-way neighborhood. He leaves his car for hours on this quiet cul-de-sac, but nobody notices. Nobody hears a thing. Nobody needs to take a midnight leak, passes a window and sees the car. Who is this guy?”
She thumbed through her notes, looking for something she might have overlooked. She shook her head. There was nothing. “Poor little thing turned ten just a month ago.”
M.C. opened her bottle of water and took a drink. “Maybe he lives in the neighborhood.”
“Makes sense. He didn’t drive in, he walked.” She ripped open the chips. “Thanks, by the way. What do I owe you?”
“Nothing. You buy next time.”
Mary Catherine Riggio was full of surprises.
“Why are you being so nice?” she asked around a bite of sandwich.
“I’m no Mother Teresa, Lundgren. Fact is, you’re no good to me if you’re not thinking clearly. You need to take care of yourself.”
Or maybe not so full of surprises.
“Let’s run a background check on every Tullocks Woods resident sixteen and up.”
“Already begun.” Kitt popped a chip into her mouth and leaned back in her chair. “He doesn’t know all my secrets,” she murmured after a moment. “He’ll make mistakes. Move too fast. Screw up.”
M.C. took another swallow of water. “What are you talking about?”
“What the SAK said to me.” She met her partner’s eyes. “Both times he called, he described his crimes as ‘perfect.’”
M.C. wiped her mouth with a paper napkin. “Right. That’s why he’s pissed. Somebody’s ripped him off. And he doesn’t think this somebody is doing it right.”
“So, what makes the perfect crime?”
“Easy. Getting away with it.”
“And who gets away with it?”
“The smart ones. The ones who are careful. The ones who plan.”
“Exactly.” Kitt sat forward, feeling a stirring of excitement. “He told me, ‘This one will move fast, he won’t plan.’”
Kitt saw that M.C. was getting excited, too. “When you move fast, you’re sloppy. You miss things. You’re seen. You leave things behind at the scene.”
“The lack of evidence was one of the most frustrating things about the original SAK murders. He left us nothing to work with.”
“He knew what he was doing. He was highly organized.”
They fell silent. M.C. reached across and helped herself to one of Kitt’s chips. “So far, this one’s no different,” she said. “He’s left us nothing.”
“That we’ve uncovered yet,” Kitt corrected. “And he certainly has moved fast. Two girls in three days.”
M.C. munched on the chip, expression thoughtful. “What else made the original SAK murders unsolvable?”
“The randomness of the choice of original victims was a huge roadblock. We never found a link between them. Yeah, they were all blond, blue-eyed ten-year-olds, but all from different sides of town, backgrounds, schools, you name it.”
Usually a serial chose victims from a specific area, one he knew well and traveled often; or he chose them from a walk of life, such as prostitutes.
It was unusual for them to operate outside their comfort zone.
“So, how did he choose them?”
“Exactly.” Kitt held out the bag of chips for her partner. “And don’t forget, he stopped at three. With each victim, the odds of capture are raised. Hell, Bundy admitted to twenty-eight murders and may have actually committed more. The SAK didn’t give us that.”
“Why did he stop?” M.C. wondered aloud. “That’s another anomaly. Usually, they don’t.”
“He was busted,” Kitt offered. “Ended up doing time on an unrelated crime. Took him out of circulation.”
M.C. nodded. “It happens.”
“Presuming my caller is telling the truth about a copycat, maybe these two met in prison?”
M.C. agreed again. “That killing duo, Lawrence Bit-taker and Roy Norris, met in prison. Went on to jointly kill five teenage girls. Your caller is pretty proud of himself. I don’t see him hiding his ‘work.’ Probably bragged about how he pulled it off.”
“But not to just anybody. It had to be somebody he trusted. Child killers are not beloved, even in the joint.”
“And even if we assume these girls are his and not a copycat’s, prison still makes sense. It’s been five years since the last Sleeping Angel murder. We need the names of anyone recently released from the state pens.”
Kitt sat back, mulling over the pieces, thinking aloud. “The original SAK committed three murders. He executed each crime exactly six weeks apart. Then he stopped.”
She shifted her thoughts to his calls, the things he said. “He believes his crimes were perfect. That’s important to him, maybe even more important than getting away with the crime. What does that say about him? Who is this guy?”
M.C. narrowed her eyes. “He’s arrogant. Cocky. Out to prove he’s the best.”
“He thinks he has proved it,” Kitt offers. “Then along comes this ‘copycat.’ Our SAK is pissed. He doesn’t think this guy has the ability to pull ‘perfect’ off. He’ll make him look bad.”
“He won’t be as careful,” M.C. says. “He’ll leave evidence behind. Or his victims won’t be random. Or he won’t have the self-control to stop. He’s already blown it by killing two girls in three days.”
He’d seen this coming. Absolutely.
He knew who the killer was.
Kitt opened her mouth to say just that, then swallowed the thought as another jumped into her head.
Self-control. Dear God.
“What are you thinking?” M.C. asked.
“If the SAK wasn’t in prison, if he was able to consciously stop in order to lessen the chances of being caught, he’s a whole different breed of serial. One with uncommon control over his urges.”
“Which would make him that much more dangerous.”
“Exactly.”
M.C. stood. “Evidence is what it is.”
“We have no way of knowing if and when he’ll stop.”
“So we focus on finding a commonality between the victims.”
“Bingo.” Kitt followed her to her feet, grabbing her jacket from the back of her chair. “Let’s fill Sal and Sergeant Haas in. Then talk to the girls’ parents.”
18
Friday, March 10, 2006
4:20 p.m.
Julie Entzel’s mother was still in her bathrobe and bed slippers when she answered the door. When she saw them, a look of fear came into her eyes, followed by one of hope.
“Have you found out something?” she asked.
“Nothing definite yet,” M.C. said gently. “We wanted to ask you a few more questions.”
