He wanted to punish the killer not just for the girl in the park or Kathy Mizell, but for all the Jeanies in the world too.
Tony Mazzetti was waiting at the parole and probation office in downtown Jacksonville when the portly parole officer strolled in with a bag of doughnuts in one hand and a giant container of Dunkin’ Donuts coffee in the other.
Mazzetti sprang from the uncomfortable plastic chair he’d been sitting in for thirty minutes while he waited. “Tom Laider?”
“Who’s askin’?”
Mazzetti had his ID out and open in a flash. “JSO. I need to talk to you right now.”
Mazzetti nodded to Sparky Taylor, who calmly closed his Popular Mechanics magazine and followed.
The heavyset parole officer led them down a series of narrow hallways. One was so tight the fat man’s sides brushed booth walls. Mazzetti worried that Sparky might be having the same problem behind him so he was careful not to turn around.
Once they were sitting in the miniscule, windowless office with drab, blank walls and the parole officer had wedged himself behind the desk, he said, “What can I do for JSO this morning?
“We need to talk to Daniel Byrd.”
“So do I.”
“What’s that mean?”
The fat man sighed and rubbed his face like it was 3:30 in the afternoon instead of nine o’clock in the morning. “It means I haven’t seen Mr. Byrd in two months. He’s never at the construction site where he tells me he’ll be. He switches apartments like most people switch underwear and misses every appointment I’ve ever set for him in this office.”
Mazzetti stared at the ineffective parole officer. “Why don’t you violate him? Send his ass back to prison.”
The parole officer shook his head. “Do you have any idea how much paperwork that’d be? Besides, you’ve seen the state budget. We can’t afford to house inmates anymore. The only way anyone gets violated is if they commit a new, violent felony.”
“What if I told you he was a suspect in a murder?”
“I’d say call me after you convict him.” The fat officer munched happily on an iced chocolate doughnut, then washed it down with a huge swallow of coffee. “Now if you gentlemen will excuse me, I’m very busy.”
“Busy! What do you have to do to keep busy? You’re not seeing anyone, not violating anyone, you don’t even get in the goddamn office until after nine o’clock. How can you be busy?”
The parole officer didn’t bother to acknowledge Mazzetti’s outrage.
Mazzetti looked at the parole officer, at his partner, and finally at the folder containing Daniel Byrd’s photograph and criminal history. He considered the few options he had to track the construction worker down. As much as he hated to admit it, this sounded like a job that Stallings could handle better than anyone else.
Lexie Hanover liked her independence. She worked evenings at Sal’s Smoothie Shack to earn extra money, but she really enjoyed working at a vet’s office during the day. The poor veterinarian was so busy in his personal life and made so little money at his beachside office that he relinquished much of the regular duties to Lexie. That’s why she knew that one day she’d make a great veterinarian herself. She had two more courses at a community college before she could transfer to the University of Florida and start the real competition for the limited number of spots in their veterinary medicine program. She knew she could do it.
Lexie rushed around her small apartment because she liked to make a good impression on people when they stepped inside. She recognized the building wasn’t new and didn’t look historical or anything like that. Not in an industrial section west of the interstate. Her apartment was tiny and therefore easy to keep clean, and her two cats didn’t leave much of a mess.
She’d been thinking about the guy she’d met Friday night. He had been very interested in her life, asking her all about her hobbies and family. Eventually he had gotten her talking about her hygiene, drinking habits, and the fact that she had never smoked a cigarette in her whole life. He had really liked that and had complimented her about her smile instead of her body the way most guys did. He had also been interested in her dreams and hopes and had told her that being a veterinarian was something noble to aspire to. He’d said he really admired people in the medical field and that his most recent girlfriend had worked at a dentist’s office. Lexie had a feeling that he was truly interested in her and she liked the way he told her she had the face of an angel. He seemed sweet and deeper than the average jerk who rolled out of Jacksonville Landing half drunk and completely immature. He had already talked philosophy with her and told her how he often contemplated eternity. Most guys talk about themselves. She definitely liked this change.
Stallings had already told Mazzetti and Sergeant Zuni he was splitting his day. He’d run down several leads in the morning and wasn’t looking forward to the afternoon. He was taking his father to the doctor for a real evaluation of his memory issues. He intended to come back and work in the early evening before he navigated to his little house and collapsed on the lumpy bed.
Right now he had a few minutes to take a risk and swing by his old house. He wanted to see Maria; something inside him said he needed to hear her voice. Even if all the voice did was tell him to get lost and leave her alone.
As he knocked on the front door he realized his attitude was dangerously close to a stalker’s. His stomach tightened and he considered chanting his mantra from work, Is today the day that changes my life? Standing at the door he felt somewhat like he did before executing a search warrant, nervous and apprehensive. The TV cops always looked cool, but they had never been shot at with live ammo.
The door opened a few inches and Maria’s beautiful face appeared. After a moment’s hesitation, she opened the door wide and said in a pleasant voice, “This is a surprise. Is everything all right?”
“I needed to talk to you for a few minutes.” He didn’t think it was a good idea to tell her he had wanted to hear her voice.
“I told you that we don’t need to explain ourselves to each other. You can have coffee with whoever you want to.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about.” Although now that she mentioned it, he still wanted to clear that up. “I wanted to talk about what my dad said yesterday about seeing Jeanie.”
Maria’s bottom left lip quivered, and she burst into tears.
THIRTY
Buddy parked his van more than three blocks from Lexie’s rat-hole apartment just west of I-95 in an odd neighborhood of apartment buildings and industrial warehouses. He knew the whole city pretty well and there was an antique hardware store he occasionally used for brackets and frames on the street. If for some reason someone asked why his van was parked in the area he could legitimately say he was going by the hardware store. The only thing that bothered him was walking three blocks in the heat of Jacksonville.
Lexie was an excellent candidate for eternity. Since their lunch, he’d been on fire with the idea of placing her last breath in the jar he’d finished the night before. He’d made this one especially for Lexie and her smooth, white skin. The glass he had blown had a light, creamy texture and was unlike anything he’d ever placed in his work of art. It fit Lexie perfectly. The jar was wrapped in tissue paper inside a Publix grocery store plastic bag along with a bouquet of flowers. He knew she’d immediately assume the decorative jar was some kind of vase for the flowers. And that’s what he wanted her to think. He wanted her to stay calm right up until the very end. He remembered hearing a farmer say at career day in sixth grade that he never let his pigs get frightened before they were slaughtered because it ruined the meat. Buddy had had all kinds of questions he wanted to ask before the teacher rushed the bewildered farmer out of the room. All the man had done was tell the truth. He had been honest enough to say that if the pigs didn’t know they were about to be shot in the back of the head it was a good thing. Buddy definitely saw the logic in that.