Chapter 8 – Female Serial Killer
Essential Listening: Who's that Chick?, David Guetta and Rihanna
0o0
The team studied the fresh body lying on the pavement sadly.
"Throat's been cut," said Morgan, bending down for a closer look. "He's been disembowelled, too."
"Reeks of booze," said Gideon, joining him. "It's more than a pattern."
"Only this time she cut off the earlobe," Morgan observed, pointing it out.
"She's sticking to the Ripper's paradigm," said Reid, peering over Morgan's shoulder; Grace nodded.
"What d'you mean?" asked Prentiss.
"In one letter of correspondence, Jack the Ripper promised to cut the earlobe off his next victim," Reid explained, obligingly. "And he did."
"It was the one day that he killed twice," Grace added, grimly.
"So she's going to kill again by the end of the day," said Gideon.
"Ok," said Prentiss. "What do we know about female serial killers?"
"Basically, you have two types," said Gideon.
Three, thought Grace, automatically.
"The Sante Kimes model," said Morgan. "Cold, calculating. Preys on men for money, takes her time building relationships."
"Don't forget the comfort killers," said Grace. "Women who think they're doing their victims – or the world – a favour."
"It's more likely that we're dealing with the Aileen Wuornos archetype," observed Reid. "Motivated by paranoia and fear, luring men with sex."
"Well," said Gideon. "This UnSub's organised. She follows a routine: she meets men in a bar, flirts with 'em over drinks… then suggests that they consummate the evening in an alley."
"Looks like rage is a factor here, too," said Grace. "Which speaks to whatever her trigger might have been."
Morgan nodded.
"We need to be on those streets," he said.
"Officers brought me this," said Detective LaMontagne, bringing over another typed letter in an evidence bag.
Prentiss took it from him and read it through, frustration evident in her voice.
"Dear Boss, by now I have rid the world of one more. So many men, so little time. I hope you don't mind the mess. They make it so easy, I just can't help myself. Yours truly."
"What?" asked Gideon: Grace had been frowning to herself. She looked up, conscious of their eyes on her.
"It's – the tone of the letter feels odd: less like a taunt, more like she's… I don't know, trying to be inclusive – sharing the joke," she explained, slowly. "All the references to 'mess', 'ridding' the world… derisory comments about men… it's like she thinks she's cleaning up."
"You think she might be a house cleaner?" Morgan asked, surprised.
"Maybe she didn't start that way," Grace reasoned. "But now…"
"It would explain the increase in the rate of killings," Prentiss mused. "She thinks she's doing the world a favour."
"Whatever she is," said Gideon. "We need to be out there, looking for her."
0o0
Another hot night in the French Quarter of New Orleans, and the clubs were heaving again, despite the killings.
The team was out in pairs, working their way through the crowds, keeping their eyes open. They'd been instructed to dress more casually so as not to raise alarm, and Pearce was having a hard time spotting the others as she lounged by a bar with Agent Hotchner, whose idea of dressing down was apparently just taking off his tie.
"How're you settling in?" he asked, his eyes on the crowd.
"After two days in a random city?" Pearce asked and Hotchner gave her a rare smile.
"That's the job," he said.
"It's certainly different," she allowed, following a vivacious blonde walking across the plaza, quite definitely on the prowl.
She reflected that this would be a good deal easier if everyone in the French Quarter wasn't on the hunt for something.
"Everyone's been very welcoming," she said.
Hotchner nodded.
"Moving jobs is hard enough," he observed. "Without moving continents at the same time. If you need anything when we're back in Quantico, my office door is always open."
"Thank you," she said. "I'll let you know when the culture-shock kicks in."
She heard him chuckle as she spotted JJ and Detective LaMontagne moving through the crowd.
0
"So we're lookin' for a woman who'll approach men – comfortable being the aggressor," said LaMontagne as they worked their way through the crowd.
JJ nodded.
"And I'm guessing she'd have to be quite attractive in order to lure them away," said JJ, looking around.
There were just too many people in the Quarter: too many targets and too many potential predators.
She caught Reid's eye through the crowd; he looked away, feigning concentration on the crowd.
For a moment, she wondered what had drawn Pearce and Reid together the previous evening – and whether this episode was going to be another nail in her friend's rapidly closing coffin.
She shook the thought from her mind and focussed on the crowd.
0
Morgan scanned the patrons at the bar, reflective and alert.
"Most of the women are out in groups," he said to Reid. "So keep your eyes open for someone on their own."
They watched the people around them, trying not to look conspicuous.
0
"So many men, so little time," said Gideon, thoughtfully.
He and Prentiss were leaning against one of the many balconies above the heaving courtyard. "As if she's on a quest… to wipe out the race."
"Or the father who molested her?" Prentiss theorised, speculatively. "Some people think Jack the Ripper mutilated women after his mother sexually abused him for years."
"Yet for someone so enraged this UnSub seems oddly apologetic for leaving a bloody crime scene," Gideon said, moving through the crowd and down into the courtyard. "Why?"
Prentiss gave a considered half-shrug.
"That might be what LaMontagne figured out right before he died," she said, following him.
0
"You've got to admit these guys are making it pretty easy," said JJ as she and Detective LaMontagne continued their circuit of the lower bar. "I wouldn't follow a stranger into an alley no matter how wasted I was."
"Yeah, but you're not a man," said LaMontagne. "Testosterone'd follow a woman to Thailand, barefoot. It's just a fact."
Their eyes moved through the crowd as they walked.
0
"You give that newest letter to Reid," said Gideon, from their vantage point at the edge of the throng. "He knows that Ripper case inside-out – he may see something we're missing."
"I don't think – uh –" Prentiss began, with a grimace.
Gideon turned to her.
"What is it?"
Prentiss looked at him for a moment before shaking her head.
"Uh – nothing."
Gideon shook his head, too, frustrated.
"Come on," he said. "You think I'm not aware something's going on with him?"
He turned and walked away into the crowd.
"Any luck?" Pearce asked, coming up behind her with Hotchner. Startled, Prentiss shook herself.
"Nothing," she said. "You?"
"There are just too many people," said Hotchner. "And whoever she is our UnSub doesn't want to be seen."
They shared a dark look before continuing their perambulation through the crowd.
0
"You gonna tell me why you missed that flight to Galveston?" Morgan asked, abruptly.
It was a question that seemed to have been weighing on him all day.
"I already told you," said Reid, evasively. "There was no cell reception."
"Right," said Morgan, and Reid wished he was better at lying.
He met his friend's eyes, trying to look innocent.
"What?"
"Reid, any time you wanna come up with a better answer I'm standing right here," said Morgan, bluntly.
Reid looked back out into the crowd – mostly to avoid Morgan's accusatory glare – but he caught a glimpse of a young woman dressed in red, moving aggressively through the crowd.
"Dark curls, three o'clock," he said, and Morgan followed his gaze.
"I got it," Morgan said, with a small nod of acknowledgement. The woman was staring at a group of men across the courtyard.
"She's eyeing up those men outside that bar," he said.
They watched as one of the men moved away from the group; the woman with dark hair followed him, hurrying to catch up as he made his way towards the mouth of a secluded alley.
"Let's go," said Morgan, and they made after her, keeping their distance until they could see what she might do.
She was closing on him, and he had no idea he was being followed – talking away on his phone as if the night held no danger for him.
Apparently, he was right.
"Danny!" the woman said, catching his arm; Morgan and Reid slowed their progress at the edge of the crowd. "You goofball," she said, holding something up. "You dropped your wallet back there."
"Thanks," said Danny, gratefully. "Next drink is on me."
The two agents relaxed a little, relieved that they hadn't had to intercede but frustrated that they still had no clue as to who the UnSub might be.
They joined Gideon and Prentiss in the middle of the teeming courtyard.
"Hey," said Morgan, grumpily. "We got nothin'."
"Well, day's almost over," said Gideon, checking his watch. "So if you're right we just ran out of time."
0o0
They walked up the alley, resigned to what they would find.
Two lovers engaged in a late night rendezvous had called it in in the early hours, and everyone was edgy this morning, frustrated that this was yet another death that they hadn't been able to prevent.
Detective LaMontagne was squatting by the corpse looking dejected. Grace felt for him. No one needed this many deaths on their manor.
She nearly stopped dead when she saw the corpse's face; she shared a hasty and stunned glance with Reid: it was the incredibly slimy man from 'Miss Dixie's'. Apparently he had been even less lucky last night.
"She's mockin' us," said Detective LaMontagne, straightening up.
"I know him – that is," said Grace, and everyone turned to look at her; Reid wisely stayed silent. "He was hitting on me in a bar two nights ago." She frowned, taking in the level of mutilation. "He was a total dick, actually – not that he deserved this."
She told them about the world's worst chat-up line and JJ grimaced.
"At least we're getting a better understanding of her victims," she said.
"Yeah," said Prentiss. "Desperate and kind of repulsive."
"Alpha males," Reid added, helpfully. Grace tried not to laugh.
"Or men who think they are, at least."
Prentiss gave her a small smile before turning back to the unfortunate corpse.
"She's true to her word," she said, sadly. "By now I have rid the world of one more."
Suddenly, Reid bent down, seeing something the others missed. He turned to the nearest C.S.U.
"Do you have any tweezers?" He took the proffered pair. "Thank you."
"What is that?" asked JJ, joining him.
"I have no idea…"
Bending again, he carefully lifted something white and square out of the victim's mouth: another letter, stained with the victim's blood.
"It's a note from the UnSub addressed to your father," said Reid.
"Let's see it," said Gideon, taking the page out of his hands.
"Dear Boss," he read. "He wanted it, with a sharp tongue and vulgar hands. Thought you ought to know another one will soon get what he deserves. Yours truly."
"An unfortunately accurate description," Grace muttered.
"It's weird," said Reid, frowning. "Typically, offenders write letters to be heard: Jack the Ripper bragged about not being caught. Yet this UnSub isn't using correspondence to flaunt her latest kill, only to explain why she did it."
"It's possible she considers herself a vigilante," said Prentiss, surprised. "That the men she's killing deserve to die."
"Then she's never going to stop," said Grace, in mild horror. "There's plenty like this one around – she's got herself a victim pool that'll never dry up."
"Will, maybe she was contacting your father – not because he was the lead detective on the case – but… she believes he'd understand," said Gideon.
"What, you think he knew her, somehow?" LaMontagne asked, nonplussed.
"Can you think of a woman in your Dad's life he helped through tough times?" JJ asked him. "Might be another police officer – I don't know, a prostitute he helped get off the street?"
"Nah," said LaMontagne. "He hasn't dealt with prostitutes since he worked sex crimes."
"The UnSub wrote: 'He was asking to be ripped. Just couldn't help myself', and 'He wanted it'," said Reid, urgently. "What if she's mirroring the man who raped her?"
The team shifted, uncomfortable with this new thought.
"Where are the files stored from your sex crimes division?" Gideon asked.
"About the same place as homicide," said LaMontagne. "Most of it washed away."
"Did your Dad have a partner?" JJ asked.
"Yeah," said LaMontagne. "J. R. Smith. 'Smitty', they call him."
"He might remember something," said JJ.
"Yeah, but they had a fallin' out."
"What about?" asked Prentiss.
"I don't know," said LaMontagne. "They stopped talkin' when he left sex crimes – that was about nine years ago."
Grace raised an eyebrow.
Interesting timing, she thought
"The guy didn' even come to my Daddy's funeral, so…" Detective LaMontagne continued.
"You have a problem calling him?" Gideon asked.
"Not if it means breakin' this case," said LaMontagne, and frowned suddenly.
He bent down beside the man's body; he looked up at JJ, who was wearing latex gloves.
"Honey, may I borrow your hand for a minute?" he asked.
Together they turned over the man's hand, lifting it so the back of it was exposed. There was an admission stamp on it.
"I'll be damned," said LaMontagne, shaking his head in recognition.
"What is it?" Prentiss asked, as they all leaned in.
"The stamp on his hand," said LaMontagne, looking up at the assembled agents. "It's admission into Mon Cherie – it's a bar in the French Quarter."
"Oh, yeah?" said Reid.
"Yeah," said LaMontagne, letting go of the man's hand and standing up. "Nine years ago it was called 'Jones'."
They all stared at him, astonished.
That old drum beat started in the back of Grace's mind: the hunt was on, now.
The thrill of the chase: it was a beat that had always driven her, taking her down roads she didn't know; increasing in pace and volume until she had her perpetrator. It was something primal – something that she wasn't ever entirely sure that she could trust.
The beat – that thing that sang to her in the dark – had forced her to make choices that she regretted, and others that she never would.
It had taken her through woods, and fields, and city streets, and once into the hell that had been waiting in her own back garden.
It had never yet been wrong.
It was as if justice had a pulse, fierce and relentless.
Not for the first time, she wondered whether really she was more like the offenders she chased than she would like to admit.
She pushed the thought away, frowning.
"Bingo," said Gideon. "Get Garcia on the horn."
0o0
For the tenth time that day, Garcia's phone rang. She answered it, with her usual flair:
"Oh Captain, my Captain."
"I need you," said JJ, pacing an alley in the French Quarter.
"Anything: talk to me."
"Is there any newspaper reports about a rape in a bar called Jones?"
There was a pause as Garcia typed.
"Zilch," she said, disappointed.
"You sure?" asked JJ. "It would have been about nine years ago."
Garcia narrowed her parameters and frowned at the screen.
"Nada."
"Ok – uh –" JJ thought aloud. "Cross reference 'William LaMontagne' with 'Jones Bar'."
"Bullseye: police blotter. Answered a disturbance at Jones Bar in the French Quarter, February 19th, 1998," said Garcia, briskly. "Looks like it was during Mardi Gras."
"You are the best ever," said JJ, with a smile.
"Aw," said Garcia, grinning. "And you're the most perceptive."
0o0
He was sat at the table in the empty bar, nursing a whiskey. He didn't look pleased to see them.
"Smitty?" Detective LaMontagne asked, trying to be friendly. "How are you?"
He reached out a hand to his father's old partner, but 'Smitty' just looked at him as if he'd just found something unpleasant underneath his shoe.
The three agents watched as LaMontagne withdrew his hand; it had cost him to be gracious to a man that hadn't even bothered to attend his father's funeral.
"I hope you got a good reason for drudgin' this crap up," he said, with the air of a man whose time was being wasted.
Detective LaMontagne gave him a long look.
"Well, I was hopin' you remembered bein' called here with my Daddy, nine years ago."
"Is that a joke?" Smitty asked.
"No."
"My name's Jason Gideon, we're from the F.B.I.," said Gideon. "We're investigating a series of murders in the French Quarter."
Smitty shrugged, the very picture of inhospitability.
"What's that gotta do with me?"
"We need you to tell us what happened the night you and Detective LaMontagne responded to the call in this bar," said Prentiss, evenly.
Smitty looked at Detective LaMontagne Jr. and gave a wry sort of half-chuckle. His expression was accusatory, as if this whole situation had been orchestrated for LaMontagne's amusement.
Detective LaMontagne gazed back, unruffled.
"Am I missin' somethin' here?" he asked.
"You really don't know, do you?" Smitty asked, as if he was beginning to enjoy himself. "After that night, your Daddy tried to bring me up on sanctions."
Detective LaMontagne raised his eyebrows in surprise.
"Why?"
"It was Mardi Gras." He said. "Some girl claimed she was raped. In this bar," he added, in case they were having trouble keeping up. "I wasn't buyin' it."
"What did she say happened to her?" JJ asked, arms folded.
"Brass backed me up," said Smitty, radiating self-righteous smugness. "They ended up transferin' your Daddy out to shut him up."
"What happened here?" Prentiss asked, growing impatient with the odious little man.
"He almost cost me my career," said Smitty, plainly still bitter.
Gideon tried again:
"Do you mind telling us what happened?"
Smitty looked at him, annoyed.
"My best recollection, she said she was sittin' at the bar with two friends," he said, finally. "One of the boys asked her if she wanted to play some pool. Witnesses claimed she was up for anythin'."
"She followed him up here?" Prentiss asked, looking up the staircase that led up to the pool room.
"His friend not far behind," Smitty nodded. "She knew he was there," he added, disparagingly.
Prentiss gave the man a look of exasperation. Just because she knew the second man was there didn't mean she'd agreed to sleep with either of them, let alone both.
"That girl was a tease," said Smitty, oblivious. "She was lookin' for a good time. Can't blame a couple of guys for goin' along with that."
"Did she yell out for help?" JJ asked, a dark expression on her face that Smitty totally missed.
"She said she did," he said, dismissively. "But not a single person claimed that they heard her."
"That's what you registered as a disturbance?" Prentiss asked, disgusted.
"It was Mardi Gras," said Smitty, as if that explained everything. "Listen to me: that girl had enough beads hangin' from her neck to jewel a small city. Anyone exposes themselves that much in one day is not a credible witness in my book."
"But she wanted to press charges?" said Detective LaMontagne, who had thus far stayed tactfully silent.
"I told her it was a waste of time," said Smitty; and then he made the mistake of trying to fill up the angry silence emanating from LaMontagne and the assembled agents. "I knew one of the accused – he was a good kid. He didn't need the stink of that accusation."
They stared at him, appalled.
Does this guy know what he sounds like? thought Prentiss, angrily.
"So you protected a rapist?" Gideon asked, managing, somehow, to make the question seem reasonable. Prentiss wasn't fooled for a moment: he was just as disgusted as she and JJ were – he was just better at hiding it.
Smitty put down his drink and scoffed.
"Well, that right there was a bone of contention between his Daddy and I." He glanced at Detective LaMontagne, who had a hard look on his face. "As far as I was concerned, no such 'rape' ever took place. Now, you wanna tell me why you went and dragged this dirt back through my life?"
Gideon gave him a penetrating stare.
"You know the serial killer who's cutting up men in the French Quarter?" he asked. Smitty nodded. "She was your victim."
Smitty closed his eyes for a moment, unwilling to accept that he was at fault.
"We're tryin' to find her name," Detective LaMontagne explained, with creditable restraint.
Smitty, who was suddenly having a hard time meeting the young detective's gaze, shook his head.
"You don't even remember her name?" Prentiss demanded, sickened.
"It was nine years ago," he said, defensively.
"What about the name of the 'good kid' that raped her?" JJ asked.
Smitty hesitated, and LaMontagne took his moment.
"Smitty," he said, walking up to him. "You tell me right now or I'll file a new sanction against you – and I guarantee you this time it'll stick."