Caching Out Read online

  Prologue

  July 1980

  “No, Mama, I ain’t seen that old dog anywhere today. I’ll go look for him before Daddy gets home.” Clutching a purple Popsicle in one hand, the boy looked up at his mother. Smiling at her with chocolate eyes, the dark haired boy walked out of the sunny yellow kitchen letting the screen door slam behind him.

  He’d seen the dog. In fact he knew just where to find the mangy mutt. Bay was his daddy’s favorite hunting dog, a blue tick hound with big feet and long silky ears scarred by the raccoon and bobcats that he’d hunted over the years. He licked the last of the sticky purple syrup off the wooden stick, and stuck it into his back pocket.

  “Well, he ain’t gonna hunt no more, Daddy.” Walking through the backyard, the boy slipped into a copse of pine trees that he was sure could touch the sun on a cloudless day. He worked his way through the trees, and skipped to where he’d left the dog hours before. Sliding down on a cushioned bed of pine needles that smelled like his mother’s kitchen on mopping day, he crossed his legs Indian style and reached over to stroke the dog’s head, softly rubbing between his soulful eyes; eyes already turning cloudy with death. “I had to do it boy, I just had to. Don’t worry none, you won’t be lonely ‘cause I got a nice place for you right by the others.”

  CHAPTER 1

  Present Day

  From the shadow of an old, red brick building, the man watched. Watching was almost his favorite part.

  Across the street sat a neat one story house with window boxes overflowing with red and yellow spring blossoms. A dark blue police cruiser bearing the Pine Ridge Police Department emblem on its side was parked in front. The blinking lights pulsed sending ribbons of red and blue shooting across the lawn and onto the stark whiteness of the house. Parked behind the car was an ambulance. He could have told them that they wouldn’t need it, not for this one, but instead he slid further into the shroud of darkness. Even though all the lights in the house were on, he still saw the flashing of crime scene cameras as they photographed his latest masterpiece.

  Too bad you didn’t get to record it too. A uniformed cop stepped out of the house and over to the railing that surrounded a small wrap-around porch. The muted light from a fixture near the front door of the house illuminated the young cop’s face, pale and grim. Pushing past a planter of ferns suspended over the porch and bracing himself on the railing, the officer bent with his head over the side of the porch.

  “Come on cop, let it go. You’ll feel so much better if you just puke and get it over with,” the man in the shadows muttered. A hint of humor pushed one corner of the man’s mouth upward. He really wanted to see the cop puke.

  Minutes turned into hours and still he waited. The need to see her body being brought out twisted inside him, forcing him to rock back and forth on his heels. Softly chanting, the man declared, “It won’t be long now Mama….just wait for it…”

  Placing his hands over his ears, the man rocked back on his heels and closed his eyes, hoping to shut out the voices that taunted him. Seconds later, words echoing from across the street stopped his rocking. He opened his eyes, smiled and watched as paramedics appeared in the doorway pushing a loaded gurney out to the porch. Like ice melting in the spring sun, the tension inside him evaporated and the voices in his mind faded into white noise. Already the euphoric sensation that drove his need to watch filled him, replacing his pain. This was his high and he craved it every bit as much as a street junkie craved the needle.

  Running a hand through his dark, short-cropped hair he watched the paramedics maneuver the gurney down three short steps to the sidewalk below. Sturdy green straps pulled tightly against the corpse held the black body bag in place. The wheeled death-cart interrupted the splay of cruiser lights on the side of the house creating its own grim show of red and blue bouncing off the black plastic. They wouldn’t need lights and sirens for this ride. Trips to the morgue were as silent as the bodies that were carried and stored there. He watched as the ambulance drove away with their still and silent passenger.

  Saralyn Parker. Saralyn hadn’t been so still hours before.

  The memories were so fresh that he grew hard thinking about it. He’d entered the house moments after she’d stepped out of the shower. She’d stood head down toweling her long, sun-bleached blonde hair. He watched a good ten seconds before she raised her head and saw him, her mouth forming an “oh” of surprise.

  Before she uttered a single word, he reached her, his fist cracking against her jaw sending the breath whooshing out of her lungs. He saw the pain twist her face as she dropped to her knees, a moan escaping her lips. Pushing her down to the bathroom floor, he pressed his body against her naked flesh. The warmth of her still wet skin seeped through his clothes. She’d fought…twisting, bucking and turning in a futile attempt to loosen his grip. He watched as fear leached the color from her face turning it a mask of ash grey. Sitting astride her, his erection strained against the fabric of his pants. As fear widened her big blue eyes he smiled, pressing himself deeper against her taut abdomen. He leaned close so that his forehead rested against hers, then smiled and whispered, “Don’t worry it will be over soon. Much too soon.”

  And it was.

  The man stood, stepped back, and stared at the lifeless body of Saralyn Parker, as the blood drain from her body. A flowing river of red ran across her breasts where it dripped from one nipple to pool on a shaggy blue rug beneath her.

  Squatting down to stare at the woman, he lifted his chin a notch and with child-like defiance chirped, “I didn’t make a mess. I did it just like Daddy and no one will ever know. You can’t tell.” Dropping his voice to a whisper he continued, “Mama says that we can never tell…it’s a secret.”

  The memory was crisp and fresh. Now, turning to leave his hiding spot in the shadows of the building, the man slid his hand into his jacket pocket searching for the token he’d placed there when he’d left the house across the street hours before. He traced the etched design engraved on the coin, loving the feel of its surface and the power that it held.

  CHAPTER 2

  Tate Echo pulled his city-issued SUV into the courthouse parking lot, slipping the dark vehicle into the slot reserved for the Chief of Police. He parked and turned the engine off. Reaching over to the passenger seat for a well-worn Minnesota Twins baseball cap, he pushed his dark brown hair back with one hand and slid the hat into place. He took a deep breath, preparing for the onslaught of questions he was sure to get this morning.

  Already the local news station had a van onsite with a home-grown celebrity standing on the courthouse steps waiting to question him about last night’s murder. Only problem was, he didn’t have any answers. Not yet. Stepping out of the SUV, Tate made his way toward the gathering crowd, his long strides quickly eating up the pavement.

  A thin and shaggy-haired cameraman made a sweep with his camera as the ‘dressed for TV’ anchorman stepped forward, attempting to block Tate’s entry into the building. “Chief Echo, what can you tell us about the murder of Saralyn Parker? Any suspects yet? Where do you intend to focus your investigation?”

  Tate sighed as the newscaster pushed the microphone toward him. He stopped and turned to face the camera, “No details can be released at this time. This is an open case and the investigation is ongoing. My department is sharing details only on a need to know basis for now.”

  Not one to give up easily, the news anchor tried again, “Chief, can you confirm that Parker was sexually assaulted during the attack? Can you tell us ….”

  Turning away from the man, Tate took the courthouse steps two at a time leaving the newsman behind, his words already fading.

  “This is KCKY news anchor Wes Lively reporting on location at the Shannon County Courthouse….”

>   Reaching his office, Tate flipped on the overhead lights and started his small coffee maker. He moved to stare out a bank of windows on the north side of the room as he waited for the coffee to brew. The Black Hills of South Dakota rose up in the distance, their dark peaks matching his mood. As the coffee dripped, its strong rich smell permeated the room. Tate noticed that the crowd below was thinning, but there was still a group of ten or twelve locals who stood listening to Wes as he continued his broadcast. Grabbing a chipped stoneware mug that he’d pilfered from the courthouse cafeteria weeks ago, Tate filled it with the dark brew and walked to his desk and the mess that waited for him there in a closed manila folder. Glancing at his desk phone, Tate saw the blinking red voicemail light pulsing on the side, demanding his attention. With one push of the button he heard Gary Hooper, the mayor of Pine Ridge, leave his name and number demanding an immediate call back.

  “Not yet, Mr. Mayor.”

  The next three messages were more of the same. The mayor again, followed by two city councilmen all wanting to know what he was doing to solve the tragic murder of Ms. Parker. Delete, delete and delete.

  “They must think they hired a damn psychic as police chief,” he muttered.

  Just as Tate opened the waiting Parker file, his cell phone rang. Snatching the phone from a brown leather holder clipped at his waist, he answered, “Echo here.”

  “Echo, this is Mayor Hooper. Tell me what’s going on with the Parker case. Did you catch the killer yet?”

  Pushing back his frustration Tate calmly explained, “The investigation is underway but it has been less than 24 hours. We’ll have more to work with once we receive the ME’s report.”

  Undeterred the Mayor continued, “Echo, I know that you had some hot shot job with the FBI and was some kind of hero in the Marines, but I took a real chance hiring you as Chief. Hell, I worked my tail off to sway two councilmen to vote with me when they really wanted Chad Green in your seat. My damn phone hasn’t stopped ringing with concerned citizens reaming me out about this murder and pointing out that I never should have hired you. For Christ’s sake Echo, this is an election year and if you don’t nail this son of a bitch, it’s not going to look good for either of us. You do understand what I’m saying here, right?”

  Tate pinched the bridge of his nose and struggled to tamp down his rising temper. He sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly. Yeah, he understood a not so thinly veiled threat when he heard one. Politics. Damn he hated this part of the job. With a calmness that he didn’t feel, Tate reassured the Mayor that he would solve this murder, promising to keep him better informed on the progress of the case.

  Disconnecting the call, Tate wondered what really concerned the mayor most, the murder of a sweet local school teacher, or his upcoming run for reelection. It was bureaucratic crap like this - and if he were being honest with himself, a failed marriage - that prompted him to quit the bureau eight months ago and move back to his home town. Having had too much from the job and too little from the marriage he’d packed up his truck and driven home to Pine Ridge, South Dakota, where he’d taken a job to serve and protect. Great job protecting this one Echo, he thought.

  Flipping the manila case file open again, Tate starred at a digital print showing Saralyn Parker’s naked and mutilated body lying in a bloody pool on her bathroom floor. Placing the photo on top of a stack of similar pictures and flipping the whole mess face down, Tate turned his attention to the report, pulling a neatly typewritten page from where it was paper clipped to the inside of the folder. Tate read, his mind absorbing details and compartmentalizing them into manageable bits and pieces. Finishing the written report, he pushed back from his desk and crossed his legs. He silently stared at the folder willing it to talk.

  “Every scene tells a story,” he whispered. “What’s yours Ms. Parker?” With a resigned sigh, he gave up on the folder’s ability to verbalize a theory and slid his chair closer to the desk.

  Tate turned over the previously ignored digital photos and spread them across his desk in order, based on the time stamp at the bottom of each one. Digital photos couldn’t be used in court since they could easily be altered, but not wanting to wait for the crime team to develop and share their thirty five millimeter shots, Tate had instructed his team on site to also take the digitals.

  Tate was still staring at the photos when his office door opened. He wasn’t surprised to see Sherriff Martin Crawley. Nodding a greeting, Martin filled a cup with the last of the coffee before taking a seat across the desk from Tate. He leaned forward and scanned the photos covering the desk then shuddered, “Good Lord, man, what kind of sick bastard does this sort of thing?”

  Looking up at the older man, Tate replied, “I don’t know Martin, but I intend to find out. What I do know is that this was not some random burglary gone bad. This was a calculated kill. The bastard took his time and he made her hurt before he finished.”

  “You get the ME’s report back yet?”

  Tate shook his head. “Nothing yet. Crime team at the scene didn’t find a damn thing. They ran the HEPA Vac and didn’t pick up even one hair that didn’t belong to Parker. No prints. Nothing. It was almost like the perp cleaned the place after the kill; if that’s the case then the bastard did a good job. The preliminary confirms rape but techs found no body fluid or other DNA that we could use. I’m hoping that the Medical Examiner comes up with something that was missed on site. We could use a break here.”

  Nodding, Martin continued to sort through the photos on Tate’s desk. After a moment he leaned back in his chair, “Tate, I know you were in the FBI and all, but I haven’t ever seen anything like this in my eighteen year on the force here in Pine Ridge. Things have gone from bad to worse out at the Reservation in the last couple years, but nothing like this has happened out there either. You suppose she’s got ties out at the Res?”

  Taking a sip from his cup, Tate considered the idea. “I don’t know. Right now, I can only think that while it’s not likely, it’s certainly possible. I’ve been going through the photo sequence looking for anything that might be out of place, but nothing’s jumping off the page at me…not yet anyway.” Tate met the other man’s eyes. “I wish I could say that this was just a rape and murder, but some of the cuts on her body push me to think otherwise.”

  Martin nodded his agreement and pointed to the photo nearest him, “I know what you mean, why would he cut her face up like that?” The photo in front of Martin showed Saralyn's face at close range, her eyes were closed, a three inch slash starting above her eyebrow cut diagonally down and across her right eye ending at her cheek bone. Bulging from around the torn lid a sliver of blue iris peaked out, as if she were watching. In the corner of the shot lay an ear that had been surgically shaved off her head and placed neatly on the bathroom rug. Once a shaggy blue, the blood-soaked rug appeared a matted purple in the photos.

  “Seems very personal to me. Most often a rapist will kill the victim so that he can’t be identified, but this type of mutilation and the level of overkill points to another type of perp altogether.” Tate continued, “It’s like the damn see no evil, hear no evil monkeys, except her tongue is still intact.”

  Martin picked up the next photo in the series, a full body shot showing Saralyn’s nude form splayed across the bathroom floor, her hands bound with some type of red cording and a dark purple bruise on her left jaw. “I see that her hands were tied, but he’d still have to be a pretty big SOB to hold her still enough to make these cuts unless she was already dead when he cut her.”

  “I thought the same thing. The bruising on the left jaw suggests he slugged her at some point. Maybe she was unconscious when he finished the kill, otherwise he would have had to use something to subdue her in order to make cuts this precise. I do know that the kill was complete when he slashed her throat. Probably used a hunting knife or large kitchen knife to finish up. His own most probably, since there didn’t appear to be any missing cutlery when we searched Parker’s kitchen.”r />
  Martin placed the photo back on Tate’s desk, “What about the red rope that he tied her hands with? That come from the house, or did he bring that too?”

  Tate picked up the photo then shrugged. “I’m not positive, but I think he brought it with him. It appears to be cording like you would use to tie back curtains, but there weren’t any other pieces in the house and it doesn’t match anything that we found. The medical examiner at the scene thinks, based on the blood pooling, that some of the cuts were definitely made while she was alive, but he really couldn’t tell without further review. Same thing with the rape. We need that damn report. Either way, the cutting took time and skill. The bastard wasn’t in any hurry, which means either he knew her or at the least he was familiar with her routine and not worried about being interrupted. Even if the mutilation cuts were made after he slashed her throat, it wouldn’t have been quick.”

  Pointing to the last of the photos on Tate’s desk, Martin asked, “What do you suppose this cut means? Looks like the Olympic rings, only there’s three instead of five. Only someone who’s really good with a knife could do that. It almost looks like a tattoo.”

  “I really don’t know if there’s any symbolic meaning. I have been doing some research online, but can’t find anything that resembles that cut other than the Olympic rings, and as you pointed out, that’s not an exact match. Daniel Westhaven from the ME’s office covered the scene and he wasn’t familiar with any Native American symbols that bear any resemblance to the tattoo cut either.”

  “Well if it is a Lakota symbol, then Daniel would know. He’s pretty much an expert. Maybe she did have ties to the Reservation and this was some kind of drug deal gone bad.” Martin pushed the prints back into the folder.

  “Once we get the ME’s report with a tox screen, we may have something more to go on with that line of thought.”