Fear Nothing (Detective D.D. Warren #7) - Lisa Gardner Page 0,115
figure this thing out, too. I think her sister is as much a mystery to her as to the rest of us, except in her case, it hurts more. Shana is her only living family, and while Adeline talks a good professional game, you can tell she’s vulnerable when it comes to her Shana. She does want some sort of relationship, even as the clinician in her understands that’s never gonna happen; Shana isn’t capable of it. Besides,” D.D. added more briskly, “if you believe this all has to do with Donnie Johnson’s murder thirty years ago . . . Adeline wasn’t around back then. Didn’t even know what had happened to her sister.”
“Why the graphic nature of the murders?” Alex asked. “If this all has to do with covering up a thirty-year-old crime, why the postmortem mutilation?”
D.D. didn’t have to think. The answer came to her immediately, from the back of her mind. “Because the murders are staged.”
“What?”
“Staged. Everything about the crime scenes, the rose, the champagne, the handcuffs, the flaying . . . It’s the killer making us see what the killer wants us to see. So we won’t notice the rest of the details. For example, the victims were asleep, their deaths quick. It’s not a crime of passion or bloodlust. It’s calculated. Staged. Frankly, I’m beginning to wonder if the first two murders weren’t simply a ruse to cover Janet Sgarzi’s death. To make it look like she was the random victim of a serial killer instead of a targeted prey.”
“Except she was already dying of cancer.”
“Maybe not fast enough. Charlie’s asking questions now, not later.”
“I can tell you one winner from all of this,” Alex said with a sigh. He moved her feet off his lap, rose to standing.
“Who?”
“Harry Day. Thanks to Sgarzi’s blog comparing the Rose Killer to Harry Day, news stations are going nuts resurrecting details from Harry’s homicide spree. Frankly, he’s gone from a nearly forgotten serial killer to front-page news. Not bad for a guy who’s been dead forty years.”
D.D. looked at him. “Told you we were stupid!”
She scrambled off the sofa, jarring her shoulder, further aggravating Melvin. But he was gonna have to live with it, because she needed her computer tablet—now.
Alex went to the kitchen to fetch a glass of water. By the time he returned, she was already Googling merchandise from murderers. Four sites popped up. She went with the top one on the list and started scrolling.
Alex came to stand behind her, as she remained rooted in the middle of the family room.
“What is that?” he asked in horrified fascination, as the page loaded up with images of skulls, bloody daggers and yellow crime scene tape.
“A website for murderabilia. Incarcerated killers write notes, paint pictures, and other people hawk it to collectors online. Apparently, when the Night Stalker died last year, purchase prices tripled for a month.”
“Are you buying or selling?”
“Window shopping. Check it out. Handwritten confession letter from Gary Ridgeway, aka the Green River Killer. One hundred percent authentic, the seller assures. Or, get this, a letter from Jodi Arias. With sexually explicit details. Holy crap, that’s going for six grand from some seller in Japan with a five-star rating.”
Alex made a face. “Seriously?”
“Face it, the Internet is nothing but a giant shopping mall. Given these kinds of items are banned on eBay, they were bound to find another outlet.”
“A signed confession letter, original art, Christmas cards,” Alex was now reading over her shoulder. “A dozen custom-designed cards from your favorite killers. Because nobody says Merry Christmas better than Charles Manson? How does someone even get such stuff?”
“Ummm . . .” D.D. was still skimming. “Based on what I’m reading, a lot of these ‘vendors’ have forged relationships with the killers in question. I guess you establish trust, then request custom Christmas cards?”
“But convicted killers can’t profit from their crimes, meaning there’s nothing in it for them.”
“Not money but time, attention, diversion. According to Adeline, boredom is a major problem when you spend the rest of your life behind bars. Maybe for the killers, that’s what they get out of it. Someone who writes to them regularly as well as a small purpose to the week, paint this portrait, design this card. I don’t know. It all looks creepy to me. Hang on, here we go: Harry Day.”
She clicked on his name, and a fresh page loaded.
“Two items,” she announced. “One is an alleged floorboard from his house of horrors. Another a handwritten invoice he gave