Ripper (Tortured Heroes Book 5) Read online

  Shit. I looked again at the timestamp. I thought back to the scene in the hallway. I looked at analysis. I had been there. I had seen the photos. What was I missing? Then it hit me. None of the photos were pasted any higher than five feet above the floor. Did that mean the person who did it was under five feet? I looked at Jerry’s height. Six feet one inch tall. His natural reach would be a little higher. Certainly, he could reach higher… Had he deliberately pasted the photos lower or did someone else do it?

  I stood up and headed to Scully’s office. He was on the phone and he was pacing. I knew. I absolutely knew what he was about to tell me.

  “You’re sure. Okay. Yeah. Mobilizing on our end. Protocols need to be reinstated. Yes. Anything at all.” Scully hung up the phone.

  “The prints don’t match,” I said and hated saying it.

  “Yeah, Jerry Moore’s prints have been found in and around his house only, but not on the photos or even on Debbie Sanders, who you already said he’d had a relationship with. He’d actually touched her, but there’s not a trace of him on her. It’s another set of prints on the photos. They’re running the prints again. Jerry’s prints aren’t on anything incriminating at all,” Scully said.

  “You’ve re-instituted all the protocols. I heard.” The Ripper was still out there. We got the wrong man.

  “What do we know? Get the team in the Bullpen now.” Scully said. It was a blow to realize we had arrested the wrong person. No one wanted that. But it had to be someone close to Jerry. Or someone close to Arm Up. That was the common thread. I needed to ask Sam to go over employee lists.

  Sam! That’s when I realized she was out there, shopping with Gwen Stock. I looked at my phone. It was seven. We’d said she’d be back at seven. I texted her. I called her. But I knew. Just like I knew something wasn’t sitting right with Jerry Moore, I knew that Sam was in danger. And it was more than the fact that Jerry wasn’t the killer. It was something else.

  Every single thing in me said there was an immediate threat and Sam was in its cross hairs. No return text or call from Sam. I felt a panic rise in my gut.

  Gwen Stock. Had we looked into her background? She had lied about Jerry. He hadn’t done what she’d said. He couldn’t be The Ripper. I needed help. Fast. “Culvert,” I called him over.

  “Yeah.” Culvert was one of the best at the agency in researching backgrounds and finding records that didn’t want to be found.

  “I need everything we can find on Gwen Stock.”

  Scully was listening, and I saw him nodding.

  “The only live victim?” Culvert asked me.

  “Yes. That’s right. We need everything we can on her. Look at the courts. Find her hometown. We don’t know a damn thing, and we need to. Fast.”

  “Okay, I’ll get started.” Culvert sat down at a computer and got to work. If there was something to find on her, he’d find it.

  “What are you thinking?” Scully asked me and I spilled it.

  “Sam is out there right now with Gwen Stock. Gwen Stock is the only victim to escape. She’s the only one to witness Jerry Moore do anything other than hit on women. And we don’t know a damn thing about her.”

  “You know that it’s exceedingly rare for a woman to be a serial killer,” Scully said.

  “That’s why we didn’t pay attention to her. She’d only been at Arm Up a short time. But what if it wasn’t a man obsessed Sam. What if it was a rival? What if it wasn’t lust, but some sort of twisted jealousy?”

  “Where’s Sam?” Scully asked me.

  “She took Gwen to go shopping for essentials since all her stuff was confiscated.”

  Scully picked up the phone.

  “Get a BOLO out on Sam Bosque and Gwen Stock. Yeah, we’ll get you pictures. This is a high priority. And we need Gwen Stock’s personal items. The stuff they got from Jerry’s house. I’ll send someone to pick it up.”

  “Any idea where they were headed?”

  “She texted me Target? Let’s send a crew to the closest one.”

  “There’s a slim chance that our killer is Gwen Stock, statistically speaking,” Scully was now trying to reassure me. He could see the wheels turning. My gut instinct was now screaming that I had to get to Sam. But I had no idea where she was.

  “Go work the case. We’ve got everything in place to find Sam and Gwen. See if you can figure out IF Gwen is The Ripper, where she’d take Sam if she planned to do her harm.”

  “Yep.” I swallowed down emotions that threatened to derail any chance I had at logical thought. This entire office was going to have to be working at the top of their game to bring Sam home. I couldn’t lose it now. If Gwen was The Ripper, I’d let Sam get in the car with her. I should have made her stay until I returned. I should have kept her under protection until Jerry’s prints were cleared. I should have done a lot of things. I’d have all the time in the world to berate myself about that later.

  Right now, I had to find Sam.

  I stepped back and rehashed some of the facts. In Las Vegas, The Ripper had a dumping ground. The case went from missing women to murdered women when they found that first body. We knew The Ripper liked to take bodies to a familiar spot. Someplace out of the way.

  While Culvert and others worked on Gwen’s history, I needed to think about The Ripper’s very recent past. Where should I search for Sam?

  I opened the file on the first girl found in Grand City. Karie Walters. Where was she found?

  Shit. Riverside. Her body was in the river, found by kids exploring an old city boat house.

  I knew then that’s where I had to go. I had to get to that place. That’s where Gwen was. That’s where Sam was.

  “Scully!” I yelled for him and he came running.

  “Got something.” I laid out the Karie Walters file.

  “The first Grand City victim was found at the boathouse, here. We assumed that she’d floated there from some other location. We were right; The Las Vegas Ripper didn’t know how to hide a body here. It’s not as easy as digging a hole in the dessert. But what if the boat house is the place it happens? The murder. If you look at the background of the photos The Ripper took, it could be the same floor.”

  “It’s the only thing we have to go on right now. I hope you’re right.”

  “Even if I am, it could already be too late.” I didn’t say any more. I couldn’t follow that train of thought to its conclusion. The conclusion where Sam was the next dead body. I prayed to God that I was right.

  “Go. I’ll dispatch a crew for backup and alert the local PD.”

  “And Culvert’s profiling Gwen Stock. Let me know if anything useful comes up.”

  “Will do.”

  “And Scully? If I’m right about all this you’re going to need to get Jerry Moore to me too.”

  “Are you sure about that?”

  “I’m not sure of anything.”

  I grabbed my jacket and head out the door.

  “Hold up. Jasper? You’re with Duvall.” Jasper hauled ass with me and we sped out of the building as fast as the lights and sirens would let me.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Sam

  There were chains and cinder blocks at the spot Gwen had led me to. The wind by the water whipped our hair around and it lashed our faces.

  “That first one here, I can’t remember her name, she popped up a little faster than I’d wanted! See, they did a shitty job of searching because they’d thought she’d floated from somewhere else. Turns out they missed me by like a minute!”

  “Uh, you mean you’ve brought them all here?”

  “Yes, sure did. But know I know how to do it right. Now I know how to be sure I have time. I mean, they might still float up, an ankle or arm can separate. And poof! But chains and some ballast do a decent job. See? I’m smart.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “Hmm? What do you think? You see that’s another thing. Jerry thinks you’re smart. He thinks you’re a good agent. He even said all the othe
r agents could learn from you. It was ridiculous, because I know. I see. I’ve watched. You flirt with those fighters. They see your legs. You smile. That’s how they get under contract. You trick them just like you tricked Jerry. But I see you. It’s whorish. You’re whorish.”

  “What do you want me to do with her.”

  “Put the chains around her.” I knew that’s what she wanted, but I wanted to keep her talking. I wanted to distract her from the idea of lunging at me with that damn taser or worse. So I stalled.

  “It won’t go around unless you help me lift her.” I pretended to struggle with it.

  “Start at the feet,” she said, and there was a look of disgust at my incompetence in body disposal. I was going to get worse and worse at it, I decided. And I also decided to make her mad. Trying to get her calm wasn’t working. But if I let her get insanely angry, maybe she’d make a mistake. I could outwit her if I kept my head.

  “You know, Jerry talked about you once. Only once, though.” I saw she was interested.

  “Keep working,” she said and I wound the chain around the knee and then around the waist. I did my best to be gentle. Gwen had been anything but gentle and I felt sorrow for this woman. For everyone Gwen had hurt.

  “Yeah, he thought you were a joke,” I continued. “He was pissed he’d ever given you a look.”

  “That’s not true. You don’t know Jerry at all. He isn’t like that. The time we spent together, he was open with me. He showed me he loved me. That was, until you flounced in and confused him.”

  “Gwen. Jerry barely knew you existed. He laughed when you were fired and he kept fucking secretaries because it was a hobby, not because he loves you or any of them.” I heard her scream and that was it. I had said enough.

  She pointed the fucking taser at me, but she was too far away and I was able to dodge it. She’d thrown everything at me and was off balance. So I scrambled up the river bank. I was going to fight back, but I wanted to do it as close to Water Street as I could. There were cars up there. There were potential witnesses. Maybe someone could help. I sure as hell didn’t want to step wrong and be plunged into the icy waters of Grand River. I’d die for sure if that happened.

  I pumped my legs up the steep incline and grabbed at the ground to get as far up as fast as I could. I felt her claw at my ankle and I kicked. I made it to the flat ground along Water Street. There were no immediate cars and the city center was too far to hope that I could scream and be heard. I ran a few more feet and looked back.

  Gwen was running at me, full speed, and her knife was out. I had a second to think about it. Less than a second to plan for how to defend myself against a crazy woman with a knife. Was my will to survive stronger than her utter hate for me? I didn’t know.

  Gwen lunged and the knife struck my shoulder, but it didn’t go in. I was sliced, not stabbed. And I was fully awake. She’d moved forward to slash at me and her momentum was forward. I stepped to the side and helped it along by shoving her as hard as I could.

  Gwen didn’t fall to the ground, but she did stumble. She turned around and tried to regain her balance, but I wasn’t going to let her. I had watched literally hundreds of fights and waiting for your opponent to catch their breath is a bad fucking idea.

  I made a fist and punched her on the side of the temple. She was shaken. She had no advantage on me. None. I was going to survive this. I knew I was. I was relentless and she was coming unhinged.

  She came at me again and this time I focused on the knife. I was going to get it out of her hand. I grabbed her wrist and wrenched it with both my hands. She fought to get away from me and I kicked her in her knee with everything I had. Sometimes a fighter had to play dirty. The knife hit the ground and she cursed.

  “Damn you, Mother. DAMN YOU TO HELL!”

  “Mother?” I said and realized I had only scratched the surface of the crazy with this woman. She put her hands up like she was going to try to get my throat. I deflected her and pushed her back.

  Then two headlights flashed over her and I saw how wild her face was. How her eyes were darting from me to the car that had pulled to the side of the road.

  I heard someone yell my name, “Sam!”

  It was Jerry Moore.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Kyle

  I guessed right. As the SUV’s headlights scanned the river bank on the way to the abandoned dock house, I saw them.

  “We’ve got to get down there.” I angled the SUV over the curb and the lights swept over Sam and Gwen. Both women fighting for their lives. A police car, carrying Jerry Moore I hoped, pulled in right behind us.

  I left the SUV, still running, and ran as fast as I could toward them. I wanted to shoot Gwen, but it was impossible. They were too close together. I could easily hit Sam instead of Gwen.

  I turned to the police car.

  “Get him the fuck down here.” I don’t think Gwen or Sam had a clue we were there. If either looked away, it could be the death of them. I understood that struggle and I was out of my head that Sam was in it. That it had gotten this far.

  “Sam!” Jerry Moore was climbing down the embankment now.

  “Get their attention,” I ordered him.

  “Sam!” Gwen looked up and saw us. Or it seemed as if she saw us. Her eyes were wild. She put her hands down and for a moment Sam kept coming. Her fight wasn’t over.

  “You called the wrong name,” Gwen said and finally Sam turned to look. Her hair swirled around her face in ribbons. Relief registered on her face as lights and sirens filled the darkness along the river bank.

  “Thank God,” she said.

  “It’s all your fucking fault.” Gwen lunged at her and pushed her to the ground. I ran. I needed to get her in custody and in chains so she couldn’t do any more harm.

  “Gwen. Gwen stop. You’re going to hurt Sam.” It was Jerry. He’d gotten her attention.

  “Who’s Sam? I didn’t do this for Sam. I did this for you.” For a moment she stood still and looked at Jerry and then down at Sam who’d been knocked to the ground.

  “I did this for you.” We slowly got closer and closer as Sam inched backward away from Gwen.

  Then Gwen turned toward the water and bolted.

  “Get her!” I said and the FBI and local police all followed Gwen Stock to the river bank. I ran to Sam.

  “Are you okay? Oh shit, you’re bleeding.” I squeezed her tight in my arms.

  “I’m okay. This is a slash, not a stab. I’m fine. I’m not even cold.”

  “You will be cold. I need to get you inside. Shock is what we’re working against now.”

  “But Gwen. I have to see.” I helped Sam up and took off my jacket. I put it around her, but she barely knew I was there. She walked toward the river bank and the now half-dozen police and FBI agents training flashlights at the dark waters.

  “Where is she?” Jerry Moore was standing there too and just staring.

  “Jerry, where is she?”

  “She ran into the water and that was it,” Jerry said and he had a blank expression on his face. He was processing something unbelievable, just like Sam was.

  “No one could survive long in that water. It must be 35 degrees,” I said, and it was true. The likelihood of Gwen Stock emerging alive was next to zero.

  “There’s a body down there,” Sam said.

  “The agents will handle it. We need to get you an ambulance.” It was just as dangerous for her to stand in the cold, bleeding, as it was for Gwen to jump in the water.

  “But what if she’s still alive, out there?” Jerry Moore asked the question.

  “She’s not,” I said, but until they had Gwen Stock’s body, we couldn’t know for sure. What I did know for sure was Sam had protected herself, survived, and if she could forgive me for not being there when she needed me, I’d never let her go again.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Sam

  I don’t really remember the ambulance ride. Or the doctors checking me out. Or the police as
king me for a statement. By the third time through I started to feel more like me.

  What I do remember is fighting for my life. And winning. What I do remember was Kyle there when I needed him.

  “I am so sorry, baby. So sorry.” He kept saying it, in between official visits to my bed from law enforcement and doctors putting stitches in my shoulder.

  “You were there. I was the one that let her manipulate me into driving away with her.”

  “She almost killed you. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to live with myself.”

  “Well, I can live with you, and that’s the most important.” He enfolded me in his arms. He was warm. That was another thing, getting warm was the focus of my universe. I hadn’t felt cold when I was outside, facing Gwen, bleeding, but I sure did now. Kyle said that was shock.

  “Agent Culvert found a lot on Gwen.”

  “Like?”

  “Do you want to hear this now?” he asked me.

  “I want to hear it now. And then I don’t want you and me to talk about it again. It’s not what we’re going to base our life on. Period. But now, yes, I need to know.”

  “She likely killed her mother.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Yeah, at sixteen her mother died in a bathtub after a space heater fell into it.”

  “Oh my God.”

  “Ruled an accident. Gwen was in and out of social services her entire childhood. Her mother and step-father were never officially charged, but it’s a safe bet she grew up with two evil people.”

  Kyle handed me a photo of a woman that could easily have been one of the victims of The Las Vegas Ripper. A pretty, dark-haired woman stared back through the yellowing print.

  “That’s her mother,” Kyle told me.

  “That’s the start,” I said.

  “That’s the start. We also found she’d been fired from two jobs before taking the job at Arm Up. In those cases, both times, she’d had to be escorted away.”

  “What for?”

  “Stalking. Making people feel uncomfortable. She had a personal protection order against her from a guy about ten years go too. There’s a lot.”