Laurie Daniels
Tuesday
October 1st, 2019
24.5 miles NW of Portland, Maine
2:07 p.m.
“GLENN SAYS IT’S BAD. They discovered the husband out back, and the wife and daughter are missing. Blood spatter was found inside, and there’s no sign of forced entry.” I sit my cell phone into the cup holder next to my thigh. I lean up on the wheel and peer through my rain battered windshield. I feel my partner’s eyes on me from the passenger seat, so I continue. “He says it’s the same MO and signature as the other cases.” I turn to Detective Patrick Collins and add with a low, dreaded tone, the words neither of us want to hear. “Patrick . . . it’s him. Morty’s back.”
Lightning strikes and thunder crackles as rain continues to pelt the hood of my black suburban. We both flinch while God’s obvious disdain of me mentioning such a vile creature rumbles among us.
I watch as my speedometer needle continues a steady push to the right. Out of the corner of my eye I catch a glimpse of Collins gripping the safety handle next to the window. The stereo takes on a static hiss as he turns with his face drained of blood and says, “I know you’re right but for heaven’s sake, Laurie, I hope you’re wrong.”
We ride in silence for the next few moments while I traverse traffic and rummage the information passing through my brain. I only know as much as the Medical Examiner Glenn Giles has shared with me; however, it’s enough to paint an eerie picture of what I am getting into. I knew by the tone in his voice that whatever he had was worthy of my immediate attention. Enough so to pull me off the drug related homicide we were on in South Portland. I turned things over to Detective Andrew Meyer and told Collins to ride with me to a possible “Morty case.” Judging by his expression, you’d have thought I told him to leap from a plane with no parachute. I know the feeling.
I bump my turn signal and ease on the brakes as I exit I-95 en route for Gray. My heartbeat thumps strong in my carotid artery. My chest constricts, and I feel my gut begin to churn. A slight tremble has taken over my hands. If this turns out to be another crime by the UNSUB we’ve all come to know as Morty, then I have some long days and nights ahead of me.
It’s been four years since the McNamara and Shelton murders. This next case could give Morty more than a dozen murders and kidnappings—that we know of—over the past seventeen years. His first murders occurred in 2002 during my rookie year as Homicide Detective. That was when he chose to end the lives of the Anthony’s and Canton’s. As for their children . . . nothing. They’re still missing. It often leaves me wanting to turn in my badge to avoid the pain and torment of dealing with these types of cases. While another part of me could never do such a thing. That would be the ultimate let down. I’d be giving up on the children and their families. I can’t do that. I can’t give up on them now. Their little voices call out to me in my dreams every night, begging me to find them. I have to press on. I have to catch this guy, and I have to find the children.
“Did he say who found the husband?” Collins’s question pulls me back.
I blink and swallow hard. “Yeah, the neighbor found him.”
“Have they contacted the family yet?”
“No, not yet.”
“Geeze.”
I make a sharp right onto a tree-covered side street and continue to follow where the GPS leads.
“The next forty-eight hours will be crucial. If this is Morty, then let’s hope and pray he’s left something behind for us. If we’re lucky, the wife may still be alive. We have to look at every detail. Everything matters. Nothing is pointless with this guy. There’s a reason for everything he does. It’s like a ritual. The sooner we can piece things together, the better the odds of . . .”
“Laurie.”
“The better the odds of finding her alive.”
My tone is not too convincing.
“Laurie. If this is Morty,” he tightens his lips and shakes his head, “It’ll be a recovery and not a rescue. You know how he is. He’s been planning this for months. The odds are not good. And the missing daughter is a whole other case within itself.”
“I know, Patrick. We’re playing catch up. But I’m hoping he’s slipped somewhere along the way. We have to remain vigilant and we can’t let our guards down.”
We reach the McCrae’s street, and I can see police lights strobing in the distance. I fight to control the tremble in my hands. The same sensation stirs within my chest.
“Are you okay?”
I wet my lips, bite my inner jaw, and nod.
The one thing I know for certain, is that in all my years of investigating, Morty is the first criminal that scares me. I’m not talking about a surface fear which you get from a jump scare in a horror film. No, I’m talking about a deep-rooted kind that sticks to your soul like the blackest tar known to man. A kind of fear that haunts you while you sleep and chases you in your dreams. The kind that watches your every move. A tormenting type of fear. The kind of fear that knows you inside and out. It knows your weaknesses, your strengths, and your very breaking point.
This guy fits the profile of the perfect predator. He’s observant. Too observant. It’s as if he knows me. And he’s different. Different in such a way that the textbooks failed to mention. It’s almost like that at each of the crime scenes, he knows I will come. He knows where I will look and what I will look for. Every time I get a case like this a fresh wave of dread washes over me, and I can’t help but wonder . . . is he the one who took my sister thirty-five years ago?