Chapter 23: Rain Rain Go Away 02
As soon as Albarino walked into the conference room of the Westland City Police Department, he was greeted by this scene:
“Ridiculous!” Olga Molozer said shrilly. “I don’t think I’m needed here. I’m going home.”
Hardy said, on the verge of breaking down, “For God’s sake, Olga—”
“God can’t help you on this case,” Olga said angrily. She frantically raked her black hair back from her forehead, then pointed at another person in the room: a tall man with a healthy wheat-colored complexion. “And clearly, this man, the great Lavasa McCade, is the only one who can help—”
“I’ve told you many times not to bring your personal emotions into work, Molozer.” The man called Lavasa McCard interrupted with a frown, in the tone of a teacher speaking to a schoolboy who hadn’t done his homework. “You know in your heart that taking your anger out on me is unwise.”
“Do I know? What do I know?!” Olga clicked her tongue sharply. Albanino had never heard her speak in this tone before. “I know that you forced me to leave my position at the BAU—”
“God, you resigned of your own accord, Molozer!” McCard suddenly raised his voice, waving his hand impatiently. Clearly, they had discussed this issue many times already.
“Ah-ha, you think after you voiced those opinions in front of those old bastards upstairs, they’d renew my contract? I bet people are starting to suspect I bribed the doctor during my pre-employment psych evaluation.” Olga retorted, her eyes glinting angrily. “All because of that book that never got published in the end—*The George Robo Case: Murder Without Motive*—”
“The reason it wasn’t allowed to be published is that it could cause harm to the victims’ families—”
“Then you damn well should have told me when I showed you the first draft! Not the day before I sent it to print, when you blocked my front door with your car!”
“How was I supposed to know you’d write that part?!” McCade’s impassive, stern mask finally seemed to crack. “Your final chapter! That’s not something ordinary people should read—”
“It wasn’t on any confidentiality agreement I signed! You think I wrote that part for sensationalism?” Olga glared at him furiously, as if she were about to flip Hardy’s conference table onto his head. “I wrote this book for the trainees at Quantico and the students studying criminal psychology. As you well know, he’s a rare specimen. Or are you worried that if it gets published, it’ll expose your—”
McCade answered coldly and firmly, “George Robo is the killer.”
“I know he’s the killer.” Olga stared at him ominously, her voice distorted into a breathy sound seeping through her teeth. “But I’m quite certain the final case was indeed the work of a copycat—and we weren’t supposed to be able to catch him.”
An awkward silence fell between the two of them, and Albanino made a futile attempt to break it: he chose this inopportune moment to clear his throat twice.
—All three people in the room stared at him in unison.
“Uh, would you all mind pretending I’m not here?” Albanino raised his hand and asked weakly.
“Come in.” Hardy let out a deep sigh and waved his hand. “Al, this is Special Agent Lavasa McCade from the Behavioral Analysis Unit; Agent McCade, this is Dr. Albanino Bax, the chief medical examiner of the Westland City Forensic Bureau.”
“Hello,” McCade said coldly. The two of them shook hands, and Albanino felt that the other man’s hand was hard, covered in rough calluses. Clearly, this special agent, aside from sitting in an office writing profiles on serial killers, probably arranged quite a few fitness routines for himself as well.
Their hands met and parted in an instant.
“I’ve heard a great deal about you,” Albanino said insincerely. He had seen McCade once from a distance at some FBI lecture before; if Hardy hadn’t spoken up to introduce them, Albanino wouldn’t have even known who the man was.
“I’ve heard your name,” McCade replied thoughtfully. “You’re that… forensic pathologist from the news a while back—the one who didn’t kill his ex-girlfriend, right?”
“My abilities are far greater than ‘not killing my own ex-girlfriend,’ Agent McCard,” Albanino replied cheerfully, giving him a flirtatious wink.
“Agent McCard is someone we requested to assist with the investigation into the killer Johnny’s case,” Hardy said dryly, clearly expending great effort to keep the conversation going. “My guess yesterday was correct, Al. The forensic examiner found restraint marks from long-term imprisonment and traces of sexual assault on the victim’s body. We now strongly suspect the killer is ‘Johnny the Killer.'”
So that was how it was: Johnny the Killer’s case was a cross-state serial murder case, and under institutional regulations it was now under federal agent jurisdiction, though of course they would also cooperate with local police. And apparently, among the people the FBI had sent, there was someone Olga really disliked.
“So I’d also like to ask,” McCard said to Albanino, “from what I know, it hasn’t been long since your case. You should be on vacation right now, shouldn’t you? Why are you currently…?”
“The head of forensics contacted me and asked if I wanted to join this case. I sometimes participate in on-site investigations of serial murder cases, and apparently the head of forensics thought it would be more appropriate to choose me as the forensic examiner in charge of this case.” Albarino answered with a smile, “So I told him: Yes, I’d like to. I’ve always been very interested in serial killers.”
McCard was silent for a moment, then asked, “When you say ‘on-site investigations of serial murder cases,’ are you referring to the cases of the Sunday Gardener and the Westland Pianist?”
Albarino answered yes, and then, as expected, saw the other man’s brow furrow slightly.
“Let me translate for you all,” Olga cut in sharply, “The Gardener and Pianist cases aren’t interstate cases, so the FBI can’t get involved unless the WLPD requests assistance; our Agent McCard must be grumbling about that internally—he can’t wait to play the righteous hero and bring those killers to justice.”
“Molozer,” McCard said warningly. “It’s also a fact that you, as a consultant for the WLPD, still haven’t caught them.”
Olga stared at him, then answered simply, “I will absolutely find out who they are before you do.”
“Alright, alright,” Hardy interrupted. The poor officer looked as helpless as a teacher chaperoning a group of elementary schoolers through a museum. “Agent McCard, come with me. I’ll show you and your team some materials. Al,” he shot Albanino a sharp glare, “you handle this for me.”
He didn’t say what “this” referred to, but in any case, he hurriedly left with McCard. Albanino listened to their footsteps fade away down the corridor before he turned his head and asked, “What is George Robo?”
“Just as you heard, it’s a motiveless serial killer.” Olga answered sullenly.
“Olga.” Albanino let out a heavy sigh, and said.
“Fine. That was a case the BAU handled before, and it was around that time that the two of us developed some… hmm, disagreements. It’s not that we had different opinions on the profile—that profile was fine, it’s just—” Olga shook her head and cut herself off, “some things happened, Al, some unpleasant work history.”
“You resigned because of that?” Albanino asked.
“Not entirely. It’s also because he has issues with the way I handle things, and we had some disagreements about publishing books.” Olga shrugged. “McCade’s professional level is absolutely beyond question, but we really just don’t get along.”
“He really does seem enthusiastic. Are you serious? He wants to catch the Westland Pianist and the Sunday Gardener?” Albanino asked thoughtfully.
“He wants to catch every murderer in the world, no doubt about that. I guess if you told him someone was going to commit a crime in the future, he’d even be willing to arrest that person for a crime they haven’t committed yet—he protects the ‘good people’ in his eyes the way a shepherd protects lambs, or a mother swan protects her cygnets.” Olga snorted. “And I guess his issue with me mainly comes from suspecting that I’m about to leave the ranks of his ‘good people’—but listen to me, Albanino.”
Albanino made a soft sound of acknowledgment in his throat and watched her.
“You’ll see, excessive justice is just as dangerous as excessive evil,” Olga said in a warning tone.
“A very thought-provoking maxim.” Albanino replied slowly, his voice still carrying a hint of amusement.
Olga shook her head, clearly unwilling to continue that topic. She glossed over it and said, “There’s no point in discussing those things anymore. Let me see the autopsy report, all right? You brought it, didn’t you?”
“I did.” Albanino finally gave her a helpless smile and handed Olga the manila folder he had been holding all along.
Olga’s anger seemed to have been somewhat soothed. She took the folder and sat down in the nearest seat, beginning to flip through the autopsy report.
This victim’s autopsy had not been performed by Albanino, because at that time they had still thought the case was an ordinary homicide, and he had been at home on paid leave, continuing to watch Shark Week documentary reruns, cooking dinner for himself and Hestal, and so on and so forth.
Albanino had also only seen this autopsy report after the forensic supervisor called him to the forensics bureau this morning, but he had already read through it once on the way to the police station, and now he had everything well in hand.
“Very similar to the cases that happened in other states before,” Albanino said, reaching out to point at a few images in the report, which showed close-ups of the damage on the victim’s wrists and ankles. “After the killer Johnny kidnapped the victims, he held them captive. They had all been bound at the limbs for a very long time—judging by the extent of the damage, perhaps the ropes binding their limbs were never loosened.”
“If the victim was bound with her hands behind her back the whole time, then naturally she couldn’t have scratched the killer during the sexual assault,” Olga commented.
“Yes, CSI also didn’t extract any testable material from the deceased’s fingernails,” Albanino pointed out. “Additionally, although the deceased did show signs of sexual assault, we didn’t find any semen either.”
“Wore a condom? As part of his counter-forensic awareness?” Olga speculated, then shook her head herself. “No, wearing a condom could reduce the sense of intimacy the killer experiences during the sexual assault. It could also be retrograde ejaculation or… anejaculation, perhaps. In fact, many sexual offenders of this type have sexual dysfunction—far more than we’d imagine.”
At that moment, Albanino recalled Tommy’s guess about “the Westland Pianist having erectile dysfunction,” and he found it somewhat amusing.
“The previous victims were missing for about a month before they were killed, but from what I can see, they didn’t become excessively thin.” Olga continued, flipping another page back. “The killer fed them?”
“It seems so. Based on the degree of food digestion in this victim’s stomach, he was probably killed about three hours after his last meal.” Albanino said. “Guess what food we found?”
Olga looked at him, blinked, and smiled.
“Good food?” she asked.
“Yes, we found meat, something like steak, as well as what was definitely the remnants of some kind of dessert. For a serial killer’s victim, that’s obviously not a bad meal.” Albanino said. The autopsy report also included photos of the chyme—he really had no idea how these forensic pathologists managed to sift out the remnants of food the deceased had eaten from that pile of stomach contents. “But how did you figure it out?”
Olga looked at him, and then that expression appeared on her face again—the look of someone observing a carnivore in a cage. She said slowly, “Because that killer loves him—loves them, loves every person he abducts.”
“An interesting point of view,” Albanino nodded, encouraging her. “Before Bart and the others get back, tell me your profile first.”
Hestal’s car began reporting decreasing tire pressure through its electronic warning system as the tires gradually deflated, and she frowned slightly.
It was not even nine in the morning yet, and Hestal was driving to the home of a client who lived in the northwest of Westland—the gentleman had made a great deal of money through rather dubious means, and in any case, he lived on a manor of over a dozen acres—to discuss some details regarding his will. This wealthy old gentleman had three sons and a daughter, so particular caution was warranted when it came to his will.
They had agreed to meet at half past nine. If things had gone according to plan, Hestal would certainly have arrived on time. But now he had no choice but to pull over onto the emergency shoulder and get out to check what on earth was wrong with his tires: he discovered that the two tires on the right side of the car were slowly going flat, and several dozen meters away, something was glinting on the sunlit road surface—it had to be those things that had punctured his tires.
“The victims the killer abducts all fit the same criteria: blond, tall, handsome. His targeting of such people is a compensation for some kind of desire of his.” Olga spoke slowly. “Some people commit crimes according to the same criteria in order to vent their anger, like Bob Landon, but this killer, Johnny, is not like that.”
“You’re saying he loves them,” Albanino prompted.
“Yes,” Olga said with a strange smile, “I think he’s choosing a ‘lover’ for himself.”
Things weren’t looking good. Whatever could puncture a Rolls-Royce’s run-flat tire and cause it to leak had to be something quite sturdy and hard; and it was precisely because this series of cars were all equipped with run-flat tires that there was no spare tire in the car at all.
Although there was no problem driving the car all the way to the destination—the specially designed support ring inside the tire could prevent deformation to the greatest extent possible—just thinking about driving a car with two flat tires all the way to meet a client, and then all the way back to Westland, made Hestal feel a faint sense of irritation.
Then another sound came from the road. A dusty gray Ford sedan rolled along the dust-covered road in the opposite lane and slowly stopped beside him. A young man in a jacket jumped out of the car, looking to be only in his early thirties, with black hair tied in a ponytail at the back of his head.
“Aside from the necessary restraints, the killer did not inflict any additional harm on the victims during the initial period of captivity. The restraint marks on their limbs were meant to prevent them from escaping, and he even provided the victims with decent food.” Olga said, her fingers brushing over the close-up photos of the restraint marks in the autopsy report.
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“But he also sexually assaulted them.”
“Yes, because he believed he loved them. Since the victims in his deranged mind approximated the image of ‘lovers,’ he naturally tended to engage in intimate physical relations with them.”
This handsome young man shaded his forehead with one hand, blocking the intense sunlight beating down on the road at that moment, and called out loudly, “Sir, do you need any help?”
Whether Hestal wanted to answer him or not, the young man had clearly already walked over of his own accord. By this point, it would have seemed impolite no matter what if Hestal simply drove off, so he looked at the smile on the other’s face—some unknown part of that smile reminded him of Albarino, which was displeasing—and then said, “No, no need, thank you. I can drive to—”
The other had already reached his side, and at this moment, certain details about him caught his attention.
That gleam of light in his black eyes. His stance, the taut set of his shoulders. The smile at the corner of his mouth and that small dark stain on his cuff.
Albanino said, “But in the end, they were still killed.”
—All of this happened in the blink of an eye.
Because the next moment, the other man lunged at Hestal, clearly intending to strangle him with his hands—lack of oxygen can cause a person to lose consciousness within seconds. Hestal, whose fingers had been resting on the car door, suddenly exerted force. With a bang, he slammed the car door—which had just been pulled open a crack—violently into the other man’s body.
The man staggered backward, and at the same time, Hestal suddenly swept at his ankle, tripping him to the ground.
Olga nodded: “Killed in anger. Look at the overkill marks left by those cuts on the neck. For some time after the victim was already dead, the killer kept slicing open the victim’s neck, almost severing the head entirely—is that right?”
“…He loved the dead he chose, but at a certain moment he also felt anger toward his victims, so he had no choice but to kill them.” Albanino slowly sorted out his thoughts. “Why? Did he finally realize that the victims he chose were merely substitutes for the ethereal fantasies in his mind?”
The asphalt surface was coarse and scorching hot. Hestal knelt above the man, one hand clamped around his throat, the other pulling a butterfly knife from the inner pocket of his suit—though a knife without a handguard had never been his preferred type. How many people, in the middle of committing murder, had accidentally stabbed into hard bone, causing the blade to slide forward from the handle and slice their fingers open? For those CSI people, all it took to convict someone was that tiny drop of blood—but there was no room for choice now. He gripped the other’s throat, gave a deft flick of the wrist to snap the blade out of its sheath, and thrust it toward the man’s eye.
In a panic, the other man threw up a hand to block it. The butterfly knife’s blade sank deep into his palm, blood streaming down along the blade’s fuller, dripping messily onto the young man’s face. A low growl of agony spilled from his throat as his other hand groped frantically at something beneath him.
The other man’s arm was taut, trembling as he held off the blade—driving it straight in was now nearly impossible. Hestal tightened his fingers around the man’s throat, but at that very moment, the other man gave a violent twist, using the momentum to throw him off.
The next second, something violently stabbed into Hestal’s abdomen. At first, it was a spasm, a dull pain like being struck by something heavy, and then—
It was a stun gun. Before Hestal’s vision plunged into darkness, he thought.
“Perhaps so. Perhaps he discovered that his victims were not the ones he truly loved, perhaps he found these victims were still not perfect enough, perhaps he lost interest in the victims within a short time—or perhaps because of a rain, something in the rain stirred up memories of past anger, so he would kill the victims after the rain.” Olga said slowly, “Regardless, in the end, the killer Johnny will kill them all… and then choose the next prey.”
Note:
[1] Retrograde ejaculation: This refers to the condition where a person can achieve orgasm and the sensation of ejaculation during intercourse, but no semen is expelled from the urethra. After intercourse, sperm and fructose are present in the urine, meaning the semen has flowed backward into the bladder.
[2] Anejaculation: This refers to the condition where the penis can achieve normal erection and engage in intercourse, but cannot ejaculate semen, or where semen can be ejaculated under other circumstances but not within the vagina, thus making it impossible to achieve orgasm and obtain sexual pleasure.
[3] Rolls-Royce cars should be using high-strength run-flat tires, and the cars are designed without a spare tire in order to free up storage space. However, the relevant content in the text was written based on the specifications of BMW’s RSC run-flat tires, because not much information on Rolls-Royce run-flat tires could be found.
In summary, this type of tire has a thicker outer wall, will not completely collapse after losing air, and the specially designed wheel hub can reduce deformation after the tire loses air. This technology can minimize the possibility of a high-speed blowout and can also ensure normal driving over a long distance after the tire loses air.
Because this kind of slow tire leak is very difficult to notice, the car was equipped with a device to monitor tire pressure. So although Herstal’s car did not have a blowout, after the tire started leaking, he was alerted by the warning.
Additionally: actually, there would have been no problem even if he had not stopped and just kept driving normally. Run-flat tires can hold up until he reached his destination. But what normal person, when the car starts beeping an alarm, would not stop to take a look?
[4] This kind of thing is a butterfly knife:
To be fair, this kind of knife without a guard really does make it easy for the hand to slide forward onto the blade after the tip strikes a hard object; however, a butterfly knife is obviously simpler in structure than a dagger with a separate sheath, and it is also relatively easy to open.
Theoretically speaking, if he carried a straight-out spring knife, he could also open the blade with one hand, but wouldn’t he always have to worry about the possibility of the spring malfunctioning? (Though strictly speaking, there’s basically no such possibility.)
Also, everyone can watch this video (starting from 3:28) to get a feel for the sexy blade-opening by the blonde beauty in *Mission: Impossible – Fallout*: