The Girls He Adored

34

Pender left the bedroom shortly after Harriet Weldon, the FBI criminalist, pulled down the sheet that covered the women to their waists, to reveal one last ghastly surprise Casey had left behind for the investigators. Below the waist both women had been hacked so savagely as to be all but unrecognizable-too many stab wounds to count had reduced their private parts to a pulp of blood and splintered bone.

Shortly after sunset, when the bodies, along with most of the FBI agents (including an extremely agitated Thomas Pastor, who had refused to speak with, or even look at, Pender), had departed, leaving the crime scene to the MoCo Sheriff's Department, Weldon found Pender in the backyard.

“I have something I want to show you,” she said, leading him into the darkened bedroom, closing the door behind them, and plugging in the portable black light laser. “Quite a love machine, your Casey.”

“God- damn,” said Pender. Ghostly white stains glowed like distant stars on the bed, on the carpet, on the cushion of the vanity chair, on several of the items of lingerie strewn about the floor, and even on one of the walls. “Hard to believe all that came from one man.”

For each of the stars almost certainly represented an ejaculation-seminal fluid glows white under ultraviolet light. Later an acid phosphatase test would verify the presence of semen, but under the circumstances, the investigators could already be reasonably certain of the origin of the stains.

“We won't know for sure whether it's all from Casey until the DNA comes back,” said Weldon, a short, pleasantly homely woman whose dark-framed spectacles, lumpy nose, and bushy eyebrows made her look as if she were wearing a Groucho mask. “But everything else points to one perp, so unless one of the victims had a boyfriend who'd visited her after the sheets were washed, I'd wager my per diem on it. Tell you what, though-I've never seen anything like it.”

Pender agreed. “Generally speaking, most serial killers commit rape not because they love sex, but because they hate women. Wham, bam, thank you ma'am, if they can get it up at all.”

“I wouldn't say this one was all that fond of women, either.” Weldon switched on the room lights, knelt to unplug the black light.

Pender took one last glance around the room as they left. Chalk marks, measurements, crime scene tape, fingerprint powder-he found himself almost nostalgic for those first heady moments when he'd been alone in the house. “I don't suppose you've come up with anything that'll tell us where he came from or where he's taking Dr. Cogan?”

“Dream on.”

“How about the Chevy he was captured in?” They walked back down the hall to the kitchen, where Casey had apparently fixed himself several meals, which he'd eaten in the living room, probably while watching television. He'd also slept on the couch.

“The Celebrity? Zip so far. Same with his suitcase, same with the bankroll. I'll go over everything in the lab for trace evidence, but until then, he's a blank.”

“Figures.”

“What do you mean?”

“One of the theories we came up with early on is that Casey is a chameleon. Which squares with Dr. Cogan's DID diagnosis. When he goes out hunting for one of his strawberry blonds, he more or less effaces his identity-becomes whatever they want him to be in order to get them to fall in love with him-not just in love, but willing to run away with him, leave home, hubby, momma, whatever.”

“The consummate seducer. But how does that”-they were in the backyard; Weldon glanced toward the window of the bedroom they'd just left-“that mess fit in?”

“Revenge. Deputy Jervis was the arresting officer. I think up until she pulled him over, he thought of himself as not just superior to everybody else, but practically immortal. He had to punish her for bringing fear into his life, for bringing him down to our level.”

“But the other woman? And all that sex?”

“I think that was just opportunistic.”

“He sure made the most of it-his opportunity, I mean.”

“I'm guessing he always does.” Pender handed her his card. “I need a favor-call me if any trace evidence turns up. Call me first- even if somebody tells you not to.”

“I heard you were in the shit,” said Weldon. “I didn't know how deep.”

“In the shit, but still on the case.”

“Wellll…” She took the card. “I guess I owe you one. That was the freshest crime scene I was ever called in on.” Then, glancing down at the card: “The mobile number?”

“The sky pager-it vibrates.” As Pender patted the pager in his inside pocket, it went off, startling him. “Speak of the devil.” He made a wiggling motion with his thick fingers-a W. C. Fields/Oliver Hardy disconcerted flutter-then used his cell phone to return the call from the backyard.

“Pender… Thanks-I'm on my way.” He pressed the kill switch and folded up the phone.

“Can somebody tell me how to get to Pacific Grove?” he called to the sheriff's deputies standing by the back door.

“Yeah,” said one of them, a black man. “First of all, be rich and white.”

“That's Carmel,” said another.

“Naah,” replied the first deputy. “Carmel, you gotta be born there.”