She paused and nodded. “Yes, okay. Call me back. Thanks.”
The waitress delivered fresh coffee to our table and left as Leslie’s cell rang. She flipped it open. “Whatcha got?” She pulled a pen from her purse and began writing on a napkin. She thanked Dan Grant, closed the phone, and looked across the table at me. Her eyes distressed. “ME’s report for both vic’s says…I’ll read the exact words…‘broken capillaries found inside the nasal cavities consistent with trauma…or pressure.’ Why didn’t I pick up on this before?”
“Because you weren’t looking for it. With all of the other wounds on the bodies, combined with the rape, strangulation marks, broken neck, et cetera, a few broken vessels inside the nose normally wouldn’t raise a red flag.”
“What are you thinking?”
I sipped the coffee and watched a squirrel dart off with a piece of bread. “I’m thinking that the killer held his hand over the vics’ mouths or used duct tape and then held their nostrils. When they passed out, he’d revive them. Then he’d cover their mouths, pinch their nostrils, and continue raping them as they died. In the case of the vic that I found, the duct tape may have been used to cover her mouth. Could have happened with the second vic, too. But the tape, evidence, wasn’t found.”
“I was hoping for a DNA hit from the duct tape hair from the feds, but nothing.”
“You wouldn’t because no one was ever charged, let alone convicted in the Miami cases. However, DNA was taken from the perp’s salvia on the last plastic bag. It’s been stored. It wouldn’t have been included in the database because there’s no ID attached to it. I’ll call Ron Hamilton at Miami-Dade PD. The three of us need to collaborate on this. You can send the DNA profile from the hair to him.”
“And if we get a match…”
“We have the most prolific serial killer in Florida, maybe the entire nation, four years later. We just don’t have a name.”
FORTY-SIX
On the way back to the marina, I got Ron Hamilton on the phone and told him my theory about Bagman resurfacing. “I believe he could be responsible for the fifteen cold case murders of women. He never retired, Ron, he just stopped killing Miami prostitutes and went inland. Made the farm country his killing fields. Or if the perp is Richard Brennen, he stopped going to Miami for weekend killing sprees, and confined his evil closer to home.”
“Is he leaving plastic bags on their heads?”
“No. But there are similarities, duct tape instead of bags. Pinching the vic’s nostrils.”
“It’s a long shot. Sean. Why not let the folks in homicide up there take it from here?”
“Because I think one of the ‘folks,’ is part of this. I told you about Slater. He ight not be the perp, but if it’s Brennen, senior or junior, Slater is looking the other way. Detective Leslie Moore will be calling you. She’s going to overnight a DNA sample we got at one of the crime scenes. I need a favor. Pull out the profile in storage from those plastic bags, the best we have from the Bagman murders. There is a good sample from the last body, and a fairly good sample on the bag from the vic that lived. Have the lab start the process immediately. I’ll give you Leslie’s cell number. Probably a good idea only to reach her on that number. ”
“No problem. Oh, almost forgot. Clayton Susskind, the anthropologist MIA, the guy who likes to pilfer through Indian graves—”
“Did you find a body?” I pictured Joe Bille’s face as he pulled the arrow out of the rattlesnake’s head.
“Yeah, I found a body…alive. Suskind, who’s unmarried, left Florida abruptly ten months ago for a teaching job at Arizona State University.”
“Thanks. Ron, have you heard anything on the street as to whether the FBI is looking into these murders?”
“Haven’t heard anything more. Why?”
“Someone placed a sophisticated bug on my boat.”
“Why’d the feds do that?”
“Good question. Next question is who’s doing the killings?”
“If the perp’s from Miami, you’ll need help to pick him up, if we can find him.”
“If it is the same guy, I think he has a connection to the farm labor camps. I’m not sure how or why.”
“What do you mean by connection to the labor camps?”
“I know it sounds strange, but if it’s the same killer, the same perp we tracked, how’s he choosing his victims? Is he wandering the back roads, the farm country picking up women randomly? Don’t think so. The odds are he knows some of these people. Somehow, maybe, he’s linked at the high end. The growers. Or he could be associated at the bottom rung, the labor contractors, worker bees who want to please a queen somewhere, or there may be no connection at all, but something is going on.”
Ron snorted slightly. “For some Miami-based killer to leave his turf, sounds like it’s out of his comfort zone.”
“His comfort zone lies in the dark. Anywhere he can prey on those weaker. The killings are increasing, so there has to be a strong motive or urge. This kind of killer wants to possess his vics, if only for the time it takes to kill. We need to start with the organized prostitution rings.”
“Why?”
“I believe these women are being recruited, human trafficking, actually held as sex slaves and offered to Johns all over the state. If it’s happening, it seems too organized for a few labor contractors. Somebody is calling the shots, and I’m betting they’re not the assholes rousting farm workers at the crack of dawn. They’re probably right in Miami.”
“You got about two dozen sleazebags, from mob to gangbangers, running prostitution between Miami and Daytona Beach. Where do I start?”
“I don’t know. Maybe where we left off when we lost the perp’s trail.”
I heard Ron sigh and then heard him tap the keys on his computer. “If you don’t have anything more to go on, what’ll make this investigation any different? The perp dodged us four years ago. What’s to keep him from doing it again?”
“Because this time he made a costly mistake.”
“How so?”
“He left a young woman to die in my arms.”
FORTY-SEVEN
I had agreed to meet Leslie at the tiki bar for coffee at 8:00 a.m. By 8:30, I was half way through my second cup, and no Leslie. I tried her cell. After four rings it went to voice-mail. There was no need to leave a message. She knew I was waiting for her, but she didn’t know I was worrying for her.
I sat at the bar, sipped coffee, and checked my watch every five minutes. A morning newspaper was on the corner of the bar. I shook the bits of toast off it and opened the pages. I stopped reading, folded the paper, and slid it down the bar.
Kim looked up from slicing lemons. “No good news, eh?”
“I stopped reading newspapers after I left Miami. I should know better by now.”
“I get most of my news online. More coffee?”
“Thanks.”
“You okay? I don’t mean to pry, but I know there’s been a lot of stuff happening. It’s a small marina. Word gets around. You’re a suspect, or as the papers have it, ‘person of interest’ in a killing. And you’re trying to find the killer.”
“Thought you didn’t read the papers?” I drank coffee, glancing at the parking lot.
“I happened to see your picture in there after they found that poor girl. I’m sorry. I think you’re a hell of a nice guy, and you’re getting the short end of the stick. The lady cop knows it. She likes you, Sean.”
“It’s her job to like people. To at least care about them and try to help them.”
“But she likes you beyond that. A woman can see it in another woman.”
I saw Big John rounding the corner of the restaurant and entering the bar like a cowboy coming off a cattle drive looking for something to wash the dust out of his throat. He said, “Morning, Kimberly…morning Sean. Gonna be a hot one today.”