Nightcrawler: A Supernatural Thriller (The Books of Jericho Book 2) Read online

  "They're prescription," the man said, lowering the lenses so Nocenti saw the translucent gray pigmentation in his eyes. "Light sensitivity."

  Nocenti didn't expect that and buckled a bit at the sight of his scarred eyes. She nodded and shot a dirty look back at Anne, trying to find her missing sense of authority.

  "Twenty minutes," the guard said, shuffling off.

  "Thank you," Anne and her visitor said in tandem.

  "I'm a little surprised they let you inside here," Anne said, not sure how to even being the conversation.

  "Why? Ian Quatermane has a sterling reputation. He passed the background check with ease," Jericho smiled again.

  "How did the thing with your eyes...?"

  "Work-related injury."

  Anne sat there looking at the man her daughter had convinced her to speak with, but couldn't figure out what to do next.

  "We got twenty, Ms. Casten."

  Anne understood that, but him pointing it out didn't make this any easier. She just couldn't figure out how to talk to a real-life assassin.

  "I'll start. Ms. Casten, what happened the night you killed your husband?"

  IV

  Ethan Jericho watched the forty-something mother of two struggle putting into words how she killed her husband. Anne Casten didn't look like a killer. Still, Jericho had been in this business long enough to know any person, whether they choose to admit it or not, possessed the ability to commit unspeakable horrors. Still, watching this soccer mom fumble over her words made him wonder if maybe the client didn't have a point. Maybe this is a frame job? The confession and guilty plea made that seem unlikely, but a couple months in the joint can shift a perspective. Jericho knew first hand.

  "It's hard to explain."

  "I bet."

  Anne Casten gave him a look, convincing him killing is something she might be capable of, if motivated.

  "It's hard to explain because everything's fuzzy."

  "Might be the drugs."

  "I don't take drugs," she said with a stern scowl.

  "Oh yeah, drugs are the morality line."

  Frustration brewed over her face. A big part of Jericho wanted her to stand up and walk out, not that she had anywhere to go. Regardless, this job is going nowhere. The client paid a pretty price for them to meet. The entire job hinged on him believing her. If he didn't, then he'd pull the plug and be on the first plane back to Provo. This is, of course, what he'd say no matter how this meeting went. Nothing Anne Casten said would convince him to sign on. He negotiated a nice interview rate, something new that might be a permanent addition to the Advantage Treatment package. Kind of like a pay-or-play deal actors get for signing to a movie. They get paid whether the thing gets made or not. So did he.

  "Jim and I were distant. We shared a bed, but other than that, we didn't talk much. A little 'how're the kids' 'how was work?' That was about it."

  "So, like, a marriage."

  She ignored his barb and continued. "I got it in my head Jim was cheating on me. Found out in court, it wasn't true. I decided to start seeing a man. We had a couple dates but kept things very hush-hush. We hadn't done anything yet."

  "You telling me, y'all weren't fucking?"

  "That's exactly what I'm telling you," she said. “But, I thought maybe things would change. Again, I stupidly thought Jim was doing the same. We went to his car," she paused and looked up to the ceiling, "and that's the last thing I remember. Til I woke up in a jail cell five days later."

  "So, you have no memory of killing him?"

  "Kinda. Like when I asked the officer why I was in the cell, he said, 'cause you killed your husband.' It didn't scare me or anything. The words sounded correct, and I had this vision of watching myself do it, like I was standing outside myself."

  "Like what?"

  "Like, I was watching myself kill him. I remember, but when I think about it, I don't remember actually doing anything myself. More like watching myself do it."

  "It's not uncommon for the brain to shut down in a moment of panic or rage. PTSD, trauma, psychosis, whatever you wanna call it," Jericho shrugged off her story.

  "You didn't let me finish. What scared me more than the fact I killed my husband, was that I had no memory of the five days leading up to it. The police couldn't find me, neither could Jim or our kids. I went missing for five days."

  "Five days spent trying to plot the murder, I suppose."

  "That's what they told me. But I don't remember any of it."

  Interesting, but not that interesting. He still isn't taking this job.

  "What happened to Don Juan?"

  "Who?"

  "Your boyfriend," Jericho clarified.

  She shrugged. "I don't know. I haven’t seen him since."

  Weird.

  "You try killin’ him too?" Jericho asked, trying to draw an emotional reaction.

  “No.”

  A logical question to ask in a highly illogical conversation. Jericho took a close look at her. In this job, he had to read people in an instant and always trust his first impression. When he looked at Anne Casten, he saw a woman in over her head. Didn't mean she didn't kill her husband, but he liked to believe a killer had the ability to sniff out another killer. He had to think that. He thought of it like a survival mechanism in the field. But he didn't get anything off her. Not that it meant anything.

  "So, if you killed your husband and you confessed, why am I here?"

  "I don't I think I was alone."

  "Twenty minutes is up," Nocenti said, popping back in the picture.

  The guard put her hand on Anne's shoulder as she rose from the blue plastic chair. Her eyes never left Jericho until the guard turned her around and escorted her out of the room, leaving Jericho alone with the picnic-themed tiled floors. The whole thing is a little more interesting than expected, and a hundred possible scenario's raced through his head. None of which mattered since he's not taking the job. The job is a no-winner, and Jericho didn't take no-winners.

  Now he just had to tell the client.

  V

  The meeting was set for 2:45 pm. Plenty of time for Jericho to drive the hour and a half from the Missouri DOC building in Vandalia to the Starbucks in downtown St. Louis.

  Starbucks?

  Here is a highly-skilled, highly-trained assassin meeting a client inside of a damn Starbucks. They must be high or out of their damned minds. Whichever, it didn't matter. He's not taking the job. The hour and a half drive gave him plenty of time to think, which is always the worst when waffling between whether or not to take a job. Except he's not waffling. He's not taking the job. Period.

  All he had to do is tell the client.

  Jericho's gunmetal black Humvee took the Grand Avenue exit off Interstate 64 and drove the half-mile north to the Forest Park Avenue intersection. Google maps say the Starbucks is in a circular building that shared space with a Chipotle in front of a small storefront connected to an apartment building. Chipotle? Maybe get a burrito bowl after the meeting. St. Louis airport doesn't have the best food choices, and that sure would hit the spot before catching the first flight back to Utah.

  Jericho parked the black Humvee and stopped, looking at the advertisement decal on the front door.

  "What the hell is a cold brew?"

  He walked into the shop and found it empty, considering the location. All the tables were vacant, save for one. A twenty-something girl with long brown hair hiding her eyes behind an oversized pair of sunglasses sat alone, sipping a latte. She had the same face as the woman he met two hours ago, minus twenty-some years. The client waited.

  Before doing business, Jericho needed to understand what this cold brew stuff is all about.

  "Sup with cold brew?" He asked the pimple-faced barista behind the counter.

  "That's our newest menu item! We make it by—"

  "I don't care. Is it good?"

  "Yeah, we use only the best—"

  "Y'all sold me. Gimme one."

  "What size?"


  "Big."

  "We have the grande, venti, and trenta."

  Jericho leaned into the tall barista so that his glasses pushed up against his face. "Big. Fucking. Coffee."

  "Yessir," he said. "Um, muh-may I get a name...sir."

  "Giancarlo. Oh, and make it black."

  The barista didn't need to tell Jericho they all came that way. He nodded before going off to make the damn-finest trenta cold brew he could muster. Jericho chuckled.

  "He's just a kid," said the voice coming from the table behind him.

  Jericho turned to find the client looking less than impressed with his behavior.

  "So are you, but here we are doing business."

  "Are we?"

  Without asking, Jericho pulled the chair out from the table and took a seat. This is the first time the two met face to face. She's younger than expected.

  He knew the client is Casten's daughter, but didn't realize how young she was til now. Alyse Casten is a student just down the road at Washington University. She's only twenty years old, but dressed in all black with dark hair and glasses; she looked so much older until you looked past those dark lenses. That's when her childish features really glimmered. She's just a kid. A kid who watched her mom murder her dad.

  "I'm Alyse," she said, holding out her hand.

  "I don't do names. Keeps the job easier."

  "Mr. Giancarlo?" The barista said with a tremble.

  "Of course, that works too," Jericho said as he quickly spun out of the chair and back to the counter. He took the cold brew coffee from the barista, a little surprised at the actual size of trenta. He took a sip and shook for a second.

  "God damn, boy! That's a good cup of coffee."

  "Thank you, sir." The barista smiled like a second grader who's teacher said he had the best penmanship in the class.

  Jericho pulled a five out of his pocket and slipped it to the kid, who nodded a thank you.

  "For your trouble."

  Jericho took a seat back at the table. Alyse looked a little annoyed with the show he kept putting on with the kid behind the counter. It didn't matter what she thought. He's not taking the job.

  "Did you meet with my mother?"

  "I did."

  "And?"

  "And what?"

  "What do you are going to do?" Alyse asked.

  "I'm going to jump on the next flight home. I ain't taking the job."

  Alyse wiped her nose and looked out the window like she was trying to figure out her next sentence. She turned back to the man she knew as Mr. Giancarlo and pulled off her shades. Her eyes were crystal blue, unlike Anne Casten's brown.

  Here's a trick Jericho had seen before. The client likes to show you their eyes, the windows into their soul so that you understand how sad and serious they are. They want you to sympathize with them. In this business, sympathy could kill a man. He's not taking the job.

  "Nine months ago, my mom went missing. We looked everywhere for her. We called the police. I called all our family. Aunts, uncles, grandparents, no one had any idea where she was. We tried her work friends, but there weren't many. We tried her clients, there were about a hundred. No one saw her. Things were getting a little tense around the house, and Dad asked me to take my sister Jamie, she's only fourteen, to the movies. He wanted us to have a night out. We did. By the time we came home, we found our mother standing over our father with a knife in her hand. Blood was still dripping off the tip. Her eyes had this thousand-yard stare. Like her brain was on another planet."

  No sympathy from the devil here. But she paid her bill, the least he could do is let her talk.

  "Your pops fuck around on her?"

  Alyse laughed. "No."

  "You sure about that?"

  "I know my dad. Anne Casten wasn't the most attentive wife or mother. Work is what my mother loved. But my dad was different. He'd never have cheated. Not in a million years. That story about her thinking my dad had a girlfriend is bullshit. I never bought that. Neither did she."

  "What did you think?"

  "Knowing my mother, I figured it was something to do with money. It normally was."

  Jericho took another drink from the cold brew. He was never much of a coffee fan. Something about drinking warm liquid never entirely made sense to him. Maybe all that time in the desert ruined the idea for him. This tasted different. This is fantastic.

  "So," Jericho said, wiping the corner of his mouth. "You saw your mom kill the old man. Why am I here?"

  "I want to know if you've ever heard of the Nightcrawler?"

  VI

  "The what?"

  Alyse slid a large manilla file folder over to him. Curious, Jericho opened the top and found a collection of mug shots, newspaper articles, maps, and hand-written notes. Apparently, the client is something of an amateur detective. In a world where anything can be compressed into a pdf, it's weird, if not a little refreshing, to find something so old school. Like one of those 70s political thrillers.

  "My mother killed my father by sneaking up behind him and stabbing him in the right kidney," Alyse said, pushing her index finger forward and then across her neck. "Then she slid the blade across his throat."

  Jericho stayed quiet. Killing him from behind is interesting. Crimes of passion are typically done head-on so that the victim can see their killer. Almost a power move over the victim. Sneaking up behind isn't uncommon, but it usually isn't that precise. If the girl said her mother stabbed him in the back fifty times, that would have made more sense. One stab to a vital organ and a slash across the throat is clean. Almost too clean. Like something a pro would do.

  "What's the Nightcrawler?" He asked, taking another sip.

  Alyse dumped the contents of the folder on the small table. Pages spilled out onto and across the floor. She didn't even seem phased. She just started pointing to an old newspaper article that read Forest Park Southeast Man Killed.

  "The Nightcrawler was a serial killer that stalked St. Louis in the early-60's. Have you ever heard of him?" Jericho hadn't. "Me neither, but over five years, he killed fifteen people. Every time with a knife. One stab to the right kidney and one slash across the throat."

  Alyse handed him an edition of the Post-Dispatch from 1963. The headline read The Nightcrawler Strikes Again!

  "Three weeks after this," she said, pointing to the article about the killing of a woman named Irma Allen, "her husband, Matthew Ray Allen, was arrested for her murder. Matthew Ray Allen confessed to his wife's murder. He remembered murdering his wife but said it was like watching a movie of him killing her."

  Those words sounded a little familiar. They were almost exactly how Anne Casten described what she did.

  "While they had him in custody, he was charged with the other fourteen murders. He never confessed to those. Still, he was convicted on fifteen counts of murder without so much as a single shred of evidence."

  Jericho heard a lot of stories like this over the years. "They had the guy. They just had to make it fit."

  "Yep. Matthew Ray Allen met the electric chair in March of '74. It didn't explain how Peter Davids of Quincy, Illinois, Rita Masser of Evansville, Indiana, LaShaun Cole of Paducah, Kentucky, Kate Rosen of Columbia, Missouri or any of the other murders, all of which were done with one stab to kidney and one slash across the throat, happened while Allen was awaiting his execution."

  Jericho looked back toward the pimple-faced barista who couldn't help but overhear their conversation.

  "Why don't you take a break now, kid?"

  "Great idea," the kid said, breaking corporate policy and leaving the shop without anyone on the premise.

  "They ever catch the guys who did those?"

  "Some. The ones they did all confessed. The rest slipped away. It's been forty years since they put Matthew Ray Allen in the chair. There've been over three hundred murders in a four hundred-mile radius of St. Louis that fit the Nightcrawler's M.O. Some of them have been caught right away. Some haven't."

  "And you're the
first person to put this little conspiracy together?"

  "No. I found out on Reddit."

  Jericho erupted in laughter. She almost had him for a second.

  "You're telling me that you're getting all this shit from Reddit?! C'mon!"

  Alyse didn't like his laughter. It 's obvious that she knew how crazy it sounded, but getting laughs, especially from someone you're paying, is too much. She gathered her papers, like she was going to leave, but stopped. She collected herself.

  "Tell me, Mr. Giancarlo," she over-enunciated his fake name, "you know killers. Do you think my mother is a murder?"

  The laughter stopped.

  "No," he said. But quickly added, "But that don't mean she ain't."

  "You know she isn't. She's a selfish, cold-hearted bitch, but she's not a killer."

  Jericho ran his fingers through his beard, trying to put the words in his head in the right order.

  "Miss Casten, if this Nightcrawler is a real person, he's what, eighty years old by now?"

  "What if he's not human?"

  Jericho didn't know what to say to that. He'd already seen a few strange things in the bizarre corners of the world that made him wonder about the true nature of reality. But not here.

  "You've built an interesting case. I'm almost tempted to learn more, but I still don't see how a guy like me helps you in the slightest. This ain't a problem I can," Jericho stopped talking and pantomimed a gun motion with his fingers.

  Mr. Giancarlo, if the Nightcrawler isn't real, then I'm going to pay the vast majority of my inheritance to help me dig around and find out the truth."

  "And if he is real?" Jericho asked, almost for sport.

  "Then, I want you to pretend he's Matthew Ray Allen and execute him."

  Jericho nodded his head and took a big long sip of the icy drink. He could almost feel the caffeine surging through his veins. He's going to need it.

  "Looks like I'm taking the job."

  VII

  Katie Bischoff stepped out of the taxicab in front of the Hilton St. Louis near Lambert Airport. Katie was thirty-seven with short, blonde hair and green eyes. Growing up, her friends always told her she was pretty, but she never really believed them and tended to dress a little modest. Tonight she wore a tight black dress with heels. She looked gorgeous. She had to be for tonight.