Chapter 24

The room smelt of prison; of angst, bitterness and dirty, sweaty metallic surrounds, mixed with the tang of violence, which sent a quiver of apprehension down Aaron’s spine. Behind him, a loud buzzing alerted him to a guest. He turned from the dingy dirty wall with a plaque of visitation rights, and his shoulders sunk on seeing it was not his father, but Dixon, the guard who had kept denying his entry each visit.

“He won’t see you,” Dixon said simply, giving a shrug.

“Dixon,” Aaron pleaded. “I’ve honored his requests before, but this is more than him and me.” Just then, he heard Maureen’s voice coming down the hall.

“Dixon, tell him I am here.” She wore as usual, dark tailored clothes and shiny black court shoes. But despite her pristine appearance, there was a worn-out look in her gaze.

Entering, “it’s good to see you.’ Maureen smiled wide and approached Aaron. Her hand coming out to rest upon his shoulder for a moment. “Don’t stay away so long.”

He agreed with a nod. “Do you think he will see us?”

Maureen pressed her pink glossed lips together. “If he knows what’s good for him.” She smiled wearily and took a seat at the metal table after wiping it down with a sanitary wipe.

“Does your brother know you are here?”

He stared at her blankly letting her know they still were not on speaking terms. As Aaron took his seat next to her, the door buzzed and they waited with bated breath, eyes wide in anticipation.

The flash of the bright orange overall jangled their nerves further, and Maureen’s hand came out to squeeze Aaron’s. They both stood as Martin Anderson entered. He was cuffed and bruised. His gait heavy with the world in each step he took. Bitterness marred his once kind features. He looked more like his other son now, Maureen thought. Big and broad shouldered, dark hair, rugged and a hint of anger in his eyes. Martin stopped at the door with a scowl on his bearded face.

Maureen gasped when she got a full view of her husband’s beaten-up face; but she knew better than to show her own anger, it would only make the situation worse.

He took in Aaron. “If I had known…” Martin’s eyes briefly met the guard’s before Dixon walked away.

“I guess I should thank you for requesting a private room at least. His eyes went from Maureen to Aaron. If they know you are here. Cops and lawyers…”

Aaron, still standing, answered quickly before his father changed his mind and left. “Yes, yes.” Aaron rolled his eyes. “I put half the guys in here, and you don’t want anyone thinking the FBI have you working for them.”

Martin cracked a smile.

“What’s so funny?” Aaron asked.

Martin’s smile grew into a twist, his head cocking one way as he said. “The devil and the saint side by side.” He shrugged. “I guess I should feel honored.” His tone dripped sarcasm.

“Oh, just get over yourself.” Maureen slammed the briefcase onto the table, a dull slapping sound resounded around the almost empty room. It had been only a month since Martin’s imprisonment, and he already seemed changed beyond recognition.

“I know why you are here.” Martin’s chains clanged on concrete floors as he stepped forward, “And no, you can’t save me.”

“No, you’re right. You killed a man. Your salvation lies only with you.” Aaron added.

“I don’t want you here. I told you both that.” He sat down before his family.

Maureen pulled a file and slid the latest victim’s images toward him. Martin’s face held no emotion.

“You here to tell me I killed the wrong man?” His eyes glanced at the pictures. “I might not have access to a television, but I have Gossip Girls…” he cracked a smile at his own joke.

Aaron shook his head. “Dad. This is serious. Please.”

“Don’t call me that! Your father died the day he killed a man. This is why I do not want you here, seeing this thing before you…”

“Dad.” Aaron held authority to his voice. “I need you, please. My partner has gone missing, this girl was her friend.” His eyes glanced down at the images on the table before them. His words were heavy. “I’m responsible for her death.”

With that, there was a flicker in Martin’s hardened gaze and his blue eyes started to water. His roughed-up hands and bruised fingers reached for the images. Aaron sat down on the other side of the table, his eyes taking in the man who raised him but appeared almost unrecognizable.

“My theory is, he is the original killer. A kind of reverse copycat situation. If we can find the other bodies, I can prove Valmer was being taught by someone… that there are … “Aaron raked a hand over his face not sure how to express his ideas to a man who probably didn’t need to know he killed the wrong man.

Martin saved him the job and said bluntly. “This is the Master’s work, Valmer was his … apprentice?”

Martin dropped the photo. Maureen could see the cracks in his hardened façade starting to show, knowing he could still do some good.

“Can you get me out of here?” he asked, the light starting to shine through those cracks now.

Maureen met his eyes hard, with the knowledge this was to be treated as a client request. “If you help on this, I most likely can.”

His eyes studied each image, anger stirring life back into him. I visited Valmer on many occasions on death row. It was my job to guide the souls of the lost before ascension.”

Maureen and Aaron listened patiently even though they recognized what he did for a living.

“He was a tortured soul, the usual abused kid story. But he tried to fight back during his late teens… What I got from Valmer was, the more he fought, the more it felt like he wasn’t quite done yet. As if no matter what he did, he felt like it didn’t erase or replace what he wanted to fix in himself. Shame, regret, and guilt mostly, about him being too weak to stop the abuse in the first place. I got the sense he wanted to perform an act that could change who he was, his soul, as he put it. To be understood by others in a higher light. He wanted to gain supernatural abilities, he said as much. He came across a ritual…”

Aaron stared hard, voicing his thoughts. “So if he’s not the vengeful type; who takes it out on those who made him feel less of a man…? He simply got hooked on the power of dominating over others?”

“I don’t think it was that simple,” Marin added. “Valmer said before ….” He narrowed his eyes on the close-up image before him of the mutilated victim, the cage made of her own ribs and her missing heart like the yawing abyss that was Valmer’s soul.

A flash of a memory, of Martins’ hands like a vice around Valmer’s throat, squeezing until he went red, to purple, then blue as the life leeched out of The Devil’s Breath Killer.

“He said, and I quote, the Devil’s breath has been unleashed. In the moment before I killed him, I got the feeling he wasn’t done; it was going to get worse. As if somehow, he was getting out of prison.” Martin shook his head. “I couldn’t let such an evil thing be.”

“Fuck.” Maureen sighed, the looked up at her husband apologetically.

Martin ignored her swearing, he was no longer a servant of the Lord, why should he care?

“Valmer told me her heart changed him that he could feel Lorel inside of him, and that is why he gave himself up. Lorel bequeathed him guilt.” His tone so mechanical, it was scary to witness coming from a man who cared too much at one time.

Aaron rubbed the back of his neck. “What exactly did he tell you about her heart, dad?”

“He told me how it tasted, the power, the power it gave him, but never why he chose her. Something about the fire inside her will unleash the Devil’s Breath. But he’d gone into such detail of killing her, stalking her that I just lost it…”

“What else?” Aaron pried.

Maureen answered for him. “He was covering for someone wasn’t he Martin. And from our records, Valmer was a foster parent right?”

Aaron caught on to what Maureen was getting at. “We need to look into his kids. Perhaps he was recruiting for his master? Fostering would be the perfect platform.”

Martin nodded and then looked deep into his son’s eyes.

“I know that look,” Aaron confessed.

Martin’s fingers combed the images before him, grabbing the one of the ribs, cut bent and reassembled like a cage.

“If I’m right, you’ll find pieces of the other victims all over this crime scene. The thread holding the bones—you think it is fish gut, but it isn’t from fish.”

Aaron’s eyes narrowed on his father’s. “You think the gut is one of his other victims?”

Maureen and Aaron shared a look.

“Every piece of this scene screams sacrificial art,” Martin concluded. “This is spiritual, ritualistic; it’s a very meaningful display of symbolism.”

Aaron shook his head. This was way out of the realm of typical trafficking cases. This was serial killer territory, but it seemed as if the cases were linked somehow. He just had to find a connection.

“Lorel palmer,” Martin said. “And this poor girl will be riddled with clues. He’s bragging about how brilliant he is.”

Aaron stood and sent a text to Bryce.

You need to exhume Lorel Palmer right away. Test every inch of her body for the DNA against other missing girls. Everything used to display her body needs testing for DNA too.

Maureen smiled over at Martin. Her well-manicured hands reaching for his, but he pulled away almost instantly. She watched as he stood and sighed deeply as Martin left the room, the clang of metal chains disappeared with him.

“Find this son of a bitch,” Maureen said. “Then perhaps Martin will come back to us.”