Watch Me (20 page)

I gave Taylor the Glock and he clipped it into his holster. ‘Okay, Hannah, time to do your thing. I want to know everything there is to know about this guy.’

Taylor gave me a puzzled look.

‘Extreme people watching,’ I said and his expression became even more puzzled. ‘You’ll like this,’ I added. ‘She’s got a gift.’

I sat down on the bed to watch. Hannah started with the bureau. She opened the top drawer and carefully went through the contents. She lifted out a T-shirt, sniffed it, then put it back in the drawer exactly how she’d found it. Taylor was hovering in the doorway, uncertain what to do. His eyes kept flicking between Hannah and myself. He was looking like a kid trapped in a giant’s body again. I patted the space on the empty side of the bed.

‘Get your ass over here, Julian. Take a weight off.’

‘Julian? Really?’

‘Still haven’t worked it out then, Winter?’ Hannah called over.

‘Still haven’t worked it out
yet
.’

‘Two hundred bucks says you don’t.’

‘It’ll be a pleasure to take your money.’

I patted the bed again and Taylor came over reluctantly and sat down. ‘Tell me everything you know about Dan Choat.’

‘To be honest, I don’t really know that much about him.’

‘Would you describe him as one of those people who keep themselves to themselves?’

Taylor nodded.

‘Quiet and polite?’

Another nod.

‘Always greets you with a cheery hello.’

Another nod.

‘The sort of fellow who’s happy to help you out if you get stuck in a jam?’

Another nod.

‘I’m liking the sound of this guy more and more.’

‘No you’re not.’

‘He’s the closest thing we’ve got to a suspect.’

‘Which is a totally different thing altogether,’ Taylor replied. ‘You don’t think he’s our guy, do you?’

‘Let’s see what Hannah has to say, shall we?’

I stretched out, hands behind my head, back against the headboard, toes pointing towards the door. Hannah had reached the closet and was riffling through Choat’s uniforms. He had five in total, which, again, smacked of overkill. The most you’d ever need was three. One for wearing, one at the dry cleaners, and a spare. Each uniform was in its own black suit bag.

There was a rack with ten pairs of identical black shoes on it, four pairs on the top row, six on the bottom, all of them polished to a high sheen. Overkill again. There weren’t enough shoes to put him in the same league as Imelda Marcos, but there were enough to make me wonder.

‘Finished here,’ said Hannah.

‘Go and check the bathroom.’

Hannah left the bedroom and returned a minute later. I sat up on the bed and crossed my legs.

‘Okay, tell me all about Dan Choat.’

‘Well, for starters, he’s got serious mom issues. I mean, look at those drapes and that bedspread. Who the hell in their right mind would have something like that in their bedroom?’

She was right. The drapes were horrific. Fussy and floral, lots of pinks, purples and lilacs. The bedspread looked like a really bad impressionist painting.

‘Also,’ she went on, ‘his underwear has been ironed. His
underwear
. T-shirts and jeans, too. Everything’s so neat it’s creepy.’

‘Maybe his mother is still alive,’ I suggested. ‘Maybe she does his laundry for him.’

‘No, his mother’s dead. This used to be her room. That’s the only explanation for those drapes. Even someone as terminally single as Choat wouldn’t choose them.’

‘Terminally single?’

Hannah smiled coyly. ‘Don’t act all innocent, Winter. That’s why you had me check out the bathroom. If Choat had ever had a girlfriend then there would have been some evidence, either here or in the bathroom. And there was nothing. Not a single damn thing. Ergo, terminally single.’

I turned to Taylor, ‘Admit it, she’s good. So what have we got? We’ve got a white male who’s terminally single with serious mom issues. He’s a quiet, unassuming guy. Always polite, always cheerful. Someone like this goes postal and everyone just shakes their head in disbelief and tells the nice news reporters that they would never have expected him to do something like this, no sir, not in a million years. I’ve got to tell you, he sounds good to me. I’m sold. Let’s go wake up a judge and get ourselves an arrest warrant.’ I smiled. ‘Okay, we’re going to play a little game. Each of us is going to come up with a reason why this isn’t our unsub. Taylor, you go first.’

‘Why me?’

‘Because right now Hannah is kicking your ass into the middle of next week. If you’re not careful she’s going to end up in charge of the Criminal Investigation Division.’

Taylor chewed his lip and stared at the horrific floral drapes. When they got too much, he stared down at his hands. Back to the curtains. Back to his hands. He stopped chewing and grinned to himself.

‘Choat’s the same age as Hannah, which means he’s too young.’

‘Nice save. Your turn, Hannah.’

She glanced around the room, ran a hand across her hair. She was thinking hard because she didn’t want to get beaten by Taylor. And that was good. A little friendly rivalry never hurt.

‘He’s a neat freak,’ she said at last. ‘That bathroom was spotless. So clean it had to have been done recently, definitely within the last twenty-four hours. Then there’s this bedroom. The bed’s made up and everything’s all tidied away. If you’re in the middle of a killing spree, the last thing you’re going to be worried about is whether or not you’ve done your chores.’

I made a sour face and shook my head. ‘I’m afraid Taylor wins this round. Your reasoning is sound up to a point. The problem is that you’re assuming the logic that dictates the actions of a serial killer can be measured against the logic a normal well-adjusted member of society would employ. In other words, you’re comparing apples and oranges. I don’t have a problem with the idea that a serial killer could go out and murder someone then come home and give their house a thorough clean. If that’s part of his ritual, then that’s what he’s going to do. It might not make sense to you or me, but so long as it makes sense to the killer that’s all that matters.’

‘You could have just said I was wrong.’

‘But that’s the thing. You’re this close to being right.’ I held up my hand, thumb and forefinger a quarter of an inch apart. ‘Burning someone alive is a messy way to kill someone. A neat freak like Choat is going to choose a nice tidy way to dispatch his victims. My money would be on asphyxiation. A pillow over the face or a plastic bag over the head. That way there’s none of that yucky blood stuff to deal with.’

‘Your turn then, Winter,’ Taylor said. ‘Why are you so sure Choat isn’t the unsub?’

‘Because if something looks too good to be true, then it is too good to be true. Choat’s been handed to us all neatly wrapped up with a pretty bow on top. There’s no way he’s our guy.’

Taylor sighed and stood up and started pacing. He was biting his lip and shaking his head and thinking hard. He stopped and looked at me. ‘I really thought we were onto something with Choat. Now we’re back at square one.’

‘You’re kidding, right? This isn’t a snakehead. Far from it. We’ve just gone shooting up a ladder. This is the best thing that’s happened all day. The closest thing we’ve had to a lead.’

Both Taylor and Hannah were staring like I was speaking in tongues.

‘Big picture rather than little picture.’ Without another word, I headed for the stairs.

36

The guesthouse was quiet when we got back, so quiet I was beginning to wonder if I was the only guest. Except for Hannah, I hadn’t seen any other signs of life. The overhead lights cast a dim glow on the red and white chessboard floor. Long-dead movie stars stared down at us from the walls.

Taylor and Hannah had started arguing and bickering back at Dan Choat’s place. They’d kept this up all the way to Morrow Street and were still going at it now. They’d tried to drag me in a couple of times, but gave up when they realised I was ignoring them. There was something almost comical about the way they stood there toe-to-toe. Taylor towered over Hannah by at least a foot, but she was standing her ground, hands on hips and not giving an inch.

‘The unsub’s rattled.’

That halted them in their tracks. They stopped looking at each other and turned to face me.

‘The big question is why,’ I went on. ‘Why did the unsub feel it was necessary to present us with a viable suspect? And why did he chicken out with his grand reveal? He had everything and everyone in place, and then, at the last second, nothing. It was a total anti-climax.’

Taylor and Hannah were still staring, neither saying a word in case they got the wrong answer.

‘What’s the matter? You both had plenty to say in the car, and now nothing?’

Silence.

‘Okay, let’s look at this from a different perspective. Imagine you’re the unsub. You’ve spent years fantasising and planning. You’ve gone over everything again and again and again, rehearsing what you’re going to do, checking for loose ends. Eventually you reach a point where you’ve done all the planning you can stand and it’s time to take that fantasy and turn it into reality. But you don’t make your move just yet. Once you step over the line, there’s no going back. You’re pretty sure how things are going to play out, but pretty sure isn’t the same as absolutely certain. So you wait a little longer, driving yourself crazy with the anticipation. And then, when you really can’t stand it any longer, that’s when you make your move.’

I went over to the counter and dinged the brass bell. B-flat, but ever so slightly sharp.

‘Okay, folks, fingers on buzzers. Last night our unsub finally put his plan into action. This morning he would have woken up feeling like he was the king of the world. Yet tonight he’s improvising like crazy and making mistakes left right and centre.’

‘Making mistakes?’ Hannah asked.

‘Chickening out of his grand reveal was a mistake because it shows uncertainty, and uncertainty implies weakness. Dan Choat was a mistake, too, because if he thinks I’m dumb enough to buy that then it shows he’s seriously underestimated me. So here’s my question: considering that this guy has gone through all the variables a million times, what’s changed? What’s the rogue variable that’s come into play here?’

Hannah and Taylor looked at each other, then at me.

‘Very good,’ I said. ‘I’m the rogue variable. Bringing me into the investigation has changed the whole dynamic. It’s made the unsub go back and reassess his entire game plan. And in the process of re-evaluating, he realised that his grand reveal wasn’t going to work. Somehow he’s got wind of the fact that we’re looking for a cop. He realised that we’d be watching the crowd, and we’d notice he wasn’t there, and that we’d have ourselves a prime suspect.’

Taylor nodded. ‘So he sets up Choat to take the fall, joins the crowd and aborts his grand reveal. Yeah, that works for me.’

‘Considering the pressure he’s under, it’s not a bad move. Maybe he’s certain we’re looking for a cop. Then again, maybe he just suspects it. He’s been keeping an eye on what we’re up to and reached that conclusion. If that’s the case, he’s going to want confirmation that we’re looking for a cop, and if we go after Choat that gives him his confirmation.’

‘So don’t go after Choat,’ said Hannah. ‘That way we keep him guessing and he keeps on making mistakes. It’s a no-brainer.’

I dinged the bell again.

‘Since Hannah’s brought up the subject, let’s move on to Round Two. What’s happened to Choat?’

‘He’s being held captive,’ Hannah said.

‘And as a little girl, I’m betting you dreamt of having your very own pet unicorn.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

Taylor fielded this one. ‘What Winter means is that Choat’s dead.’

He glanced over at me for confirmation and I answered with a nod.

‘There’s no reason to keep him alive, and a whole load of reasons to kill him. If he’s dead, there’s no chance of him escaping and identifying the unsub. Secondly, a dead body is lower maintenance than a live one. You don’t need a deep, dark dungeon to hide your victim in, you don’t need to feed them. You get the idea.’

I dinged the bell a third time because I liked the sound, and the effect it had. Taylor and Hannah’s attention snapped back to me. ‘So what do we do? Hannah’s suggestion is one possibility. We do nothing. The problem with that strategy is that it’s going to be a major stressor for the unsub. He’s going to be sat there trying to double guess us, and treble guess us, and quadruple guess us, and that’s going to drive him nuts. The more stress we pile on, the more unpredictable his actions become. Which is good because, like Hannah said, he’ll make mistakes. But it’s bad because it could push him to kill sooner than he would have done otherwise. Do either of you want that on your conscience?’

Hannah and Taylor shook their heads.

‘The alternative is that we play along with the unsub. We go charging in, telling anyone who’ll listen that Choat’s the bad guy. Sheriff Fortier and Shepherd will rally the troops and before we know it every spare man will be out hunting Choat. While they’re doing that we hang around on the sidelines and keep our eyes peeled for anyone who’s looking particularly smug.’

‘So what do we do?’ asked Hannah, echoing my earlier question.

‘We sleep on it. We’ll meet at Apollo’s for breakfast at eight and make a decision then. Letting the unsub sweat it out for a few hours shouldn’t cause a problem, and we’re all exhausted. We need to sleep.’

When I said we, I meant me, but Taylor and Hannah both looked as tired as I felt. Back in my room, I poured a glass of Glenmorangie, put on some Mozart and opened the window. A gentle breeze blew through, fluttering the drapes. I lit a cigarette then perched on the windowsill. With the room door closed, the outside world ceased to exist. The music and the whisky helped complete the illusion. And it was an illusion. At any moment my cell could ring, bursting my bubble. Midnight calls went with the territory. The people I hunted respected chronological constraints as much as they respected geographical borders.

The second movement of Mozart’s one and only Clarinet Concerto was playing gently in the background. This was my all-time favourite piece of music. The way that clarinet sings, it’s the loneliest sound in the world. Show me someone who isn’t moved and I’ll show you someone who doesn’t have a soul.