this Uretsky guy, but he’s a level three sex offender. We’ve got one count of assault with intent to commit rape, indecent assault and battery on a person aged fourteen or older, and two counts of rape.”
“Crap,” I said. Ruby looked at me. I mouthed the word rapist and watched her pale skin turn even paler. “Shouldn’t he be in jail?” I asked.
“He served seven years, then got out,” Clegg said. “Average time behind bars is eleven for rapists, in case you wanted to know.”
I didn’t want to know. Seemed like infinity would be a more fitting sentence for a scumbag like Swain, but what do I know about the law.
“Got any physical stats on him?” I asked.
“White male, forty-six, six feet, two-ten. Hair brown. Eyes brown.”
“Can you send me a picture?”
“Sure. Or you can look him up yourself on the SORB Web site.”
“SORB?” I asked.
“Sex Offender Registry Board.”
“One more question,” I said, signaling to make a left turn. “The address I gave you, is that Mom’s place or his?”
Clegg looked it up. “By Mom I’m assuming you mean Lucille Swain, and yes, she’s the registered owner of the property on that address,” he said. “So, is this guy giving you grief? I’ve got plenty of contacts in the Medford PD who would love to pay this piece-o-crap a visit.”
“No. Not really. I’ll just deactivate his account. Thanks for the help.”
“Okay, hombre,” Clegg said. “Call anytime.”
I ended the call, wondering if the next time I tried to reach Clegg, he would be someplace far away, feet high above the earth, smelling the purity of the sky and feeling his soul come alive. I wished I could join him.
“What do you make of that?” Ruby asked after I put my phone away. I shouldn’t have been talking and driving, anyway. At least it wasn’t another crime.
“Well, let’s assess the situation,” I said. “The Uretskys seem to have vanished.”
“True,” Ruby said.
“But Elliot is a murdering psychopath who is still antagonizing us.”
“True, as well.”
“We know he’s going to try and make me commit another felony, and we have no clue what his snake and lotus flower thing means.”
“Kesha,” Ruby said.
“It’s not Kesha,” I said, “but yes, Kesha. Meanwhile, the Uretskys’ neighbor, Ruth Shane, is convinced that Carl Swain has something to do with their disappearance, or at least Tanya Uretsky’s disappearance, and it turns out she has some real reasons to think the way she does. Swain is a registered sex offender with a gun-toting mama.”
“So what do we do?”
“We wait for Uretsky to contact me. Today should be the day. And we take it from there.”
We didn’t have to wait long. We were back in the apartment on Harvard Avenue, or “John’s Place,” as Ruby had taken to calling it. Ruby was feeding Ginger, and I was washing the potatoes we would have with dinner. Neither of us had grown accustomed to the fact that while embroiled in this nightmare, Ruby and I were required to observe the rules of life. We had to eat. We had to sleep. We were still alive, and though trapped beneath the shadow of pain and guilt cast by the deaths of Rhonda Jennings and Brooks Hall, we were obliged to live.
I kept my phone by the sink. When it chirped, I drew in a ragged breath, glanced at the text message, and yelled out, “Uretsky!”
Ruby came running over to read it. I assumed his text was untraceable; a guy who knew how to configure routers to hide out on the Internet knew how to send untraceable texts, too.
Uretsky’s text message read: Have you figured out my clue?
I texted him back—what the hell, why not? I was honest, too. I saw no reason to lie. It wouldn’t help us any. I wrote: We couldn’t spell your clue.
He wrote back: LOL! I didn’t think of that. Honestly, this deranged psycho used LOL! Like we were pals having a conversation over a Facebook status. The snake and lotus flower are gripped in Qetesh’s hands.
I showed the phone to Ruby and said, “Google Qetesh. Q-E-T-E-S-H.” Ruby went over to my laptop and typed in the correct spelling. She read for me verbatim what Wikipedia had to say about it. “Qetesh is a Sumerian goddess adopted into Egyptian mythology from the Canaanite religion, popular during the New Kingdom. She was a fertility goddess of sacred ecstasy and sexual pleasure.”
“What the heck?” I said, mulling that over. “Google the snake and lotus flower and Qetesh.”