The Wilcoxes remembered little else that was noteworthy. Raney indicated an older man and woman across the street, walking a golden retriever, and they went to them.
Doris Stitz was a retired schoolteacher, and her husband, Harvey, was a retired mechanic. They lived at the corner of the street.
We came down to see what all this fuss was today, Harvey said.
Weve been following the story in the news, Doris said. And its just getting worse and worse. Its so awful. You never expect this kind of thing in our quiet little town.
Did you ever meet Nelson?
Once, Harvey said. He seemed friendly enough, but it felt like it was forced. You got a sense that he wanted to be left alone.
How so?
Just an air about him. It was last year. Boone, here, got off his leash and chased a squirrel into Nelsons backyard. I rang his doorbell and asked if I could go get my dog. Nelson just gave off this icy air, like he didnt appreciate being bothered, or want anybody on his property. Then he said I could go get Boone. I didnt notice anything back there. It was all very well kept, very neat. On my way out with Boone, Nelson looked at my ball cap, asked if I was a Broncos fan. I said damn straight I am, then Nelson smiled and that was it.
The Denver Broncos, the NFL football team? Kate made a quick note.
Yes.
Did Nelson ever say if he lived in Denver?
Heck no, that was the extent of our conversation, Harvey said. I dont think that guy ever really talked with anyone.
During the drive to the Syracuse airport, Kate updated her story. Along the way she called Grace, who was happy shed be home later that night.
Did you get me a present?
Sure did.
What is it?
A surprise.
Kate then used the drive time to continue looking into the Denver Star-Times story. She needed to talk to Will Goodsill, the reporter. Maybe Goodsill could get in touch with his source, prompt him on what became of the promising leads.
Online she found scores of listings for Goodsill across the country, a few in Denver, none for a Will Goodsill. She started making calls and leaving messages, knowing it was a long shot. The story was fifteen years old. Memories fade, people move and people die.
After Raney dropped Kate off at the airport she checked her bag, went through security and on to pre-boarding. At her gate, TV screens suspended throughout the area, were dialed to news networks with pictures of Carl Nelson flashing across them.
The Rampart case had exploded into a national story.
Again, Kate met the cold eyes that glared from the face of a fully bearded man with wild hair, in his forties.
Carl Nelson.
Is this the last face my sister saw?
This was her enemy.
If you killed my sister, then Ill find you. I swear to God, Ill find you.
Before boarding, Kate downloaded every fresh news story she could find so she could go through them during the flight.
On the plane, Kate studied the news reports. The TV items carried pictures of Nelson, accompanied by the pool images of the razed barn and investigators in white coveralls sifting the earth for human remains in a remote corner of the isolated property.
Network graphic headlines called the case:
Horror in Upstate NY
NY Body Farm
Hunt for a Monster
All day long Kate had struggled to push one supreme fear out of her mind, but now it hit her full force, the old agony tearing at her with renewed ferocity. She turned from the laptop to her window. Somewhere down there were either the ashes of her sisters prison or the remnants of her grave.
Oh, God, I dont know if I can do this.
Kate turned back to her monitor to see it filled with Carl Nelsons face glowering at her above the new headline:
Face of Evil: Who Is Carl Nelson?
25
Gary, Indiana
The toilet ran on, the mattress sagged and brownish stains webbed down the cracked walls of the motel room at the citys fringe near the interstate.
The guest in Unit 14 didnt care.
The Slumber Breeze Inns customers were chiefly addicts, hookers and deviants. But Unit 14 considered himself well above that stratum. What mattered was that the motel accepted cash while providing anonymity and indifference.
Working at two laptops on the rooms desk, was Sorin Zurrn. But nobody-nobody living-knew him by that name, a name that resurrected undying pain for him. At this moment, he was Donald W.R. Fulmert, age thirty-two, a professional driver from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
In the darkness, his clean-shaven face and bald head glowed spectrally in the bluish light of his computer screens. He glimpsed himself in the rooms fractured mirror, satisfied that he bore no resemblance to Carl Nelson.
That man had never really existed.
Zurrn had grown comfortable living in Nelsons skin, quietly tending to his collection over the years. But hed never intended to reside there forever. Hed grown restless and proud of what hed achieved.
But Rampart was such a small stage.
He deserved adoration for his accomplishments.
Although it was dangerous, he yearned for the world to be aware of his power; he ached for his life to be bigger, something grandiose and magnificent. He had to move on to the next stage of his evolution.
Over the past few years, hed planned it all with such attention to detail, he thought, admiring the photographs of his new property. This would be his Asgard, his Valhalla; his Palace of Supreme Perfection. He could almost touch it, but it was still over a thousand miles and several states away, a vast expanse of isolated land.
The cost was unimportant.
Obtaining money was easy for him.
He knew the electronic security gaps with retailers and banks. Three months ago, hed siphoned more than nine hundred thousand dollars in unmarked, nonsequential bills from cash advance kiosks at casinos in Las Vegas and Atlantic City. He had access to an eternity of credit cards and identities, enabling him to be anyone he needed to be, with access to just about anything.
And he could do it all without leaving a trace.
As he continued looking at pictures of his sweeping new property, envisioning how glorious his new kingdom would be, one of his laptops trilled with a message from Ashley.
Hes so hot. Totally crushing on him! IDK! Help!
The pretty fourteen-year-old from Minnesota was breathless about a boy named Nick. Zurrn had been cultivating her online for the past six months, convincing her that he was Jenn, a sixteen-year-old girl from Milwaukee. Hed drilled deep into Ashleys life. He knew everything about her and her family-their home address, all their bank and credit card information, their medications, Ashleys grades, her habits and daily routine. Hed done a little work to get a feed off her phone and laptop so he could remotely watch her undetected.
He responded to her plea: Tell him, Ash! GTG! BFF!
BFF!
Best Friends Forever. Poor little Ashley might find out what forever really means, for Zurrn had her believing that Jenns parents were taking her to the Mall of America soon.
Now, Ashley was dying to meet her BFF.
Wait, whats this?
In the corner of the room, a muted TV was tuned to an all-news channel. Images of the crime scene at a farm in Rampart, New York, appeared, prompting Zurrn to reach for the remote.
Carl Nelsons face filled the TV over a graphic that read, Wanted by the FBI. As Zurrn listened, he went online, checking major news sites, devouring the breaking story.
What the hells this?
In the past few days, hed monitored the initial coverage of the Rampart story. As expected, early reports portrayed it as a local murder-suicide. Coverage was contained to the region. Thats how it was designed and executed to play, with Carl Nelson and the woman dead, allowing Zurrn to disappear.
A perfect crime.
What happened?
Now, a woman named Kate Page was telling reporters of her search for her sister. A series of photos appeared from the cold case of a ten-year-old girl missing for fifteen years from Alberta, Canada.
In my heart I feel my sisters case is linked to the Alberta case and these events in Rampart. I want to find the man who did this. I want to know what happened. Id give anything to see her again.
Zurrn locked on to Kate Page, his face burning with contempt.
Long after the news ended, Zurrn sat motionless in the near dark, his neck muscles pulsating as he processed the news over the quiet hum of interstate traffic. Then loud music began throbbing from several rooms away, with the roll of drums hammering along the motel as if to signal war.
He went to one of the online news stories and examined the accompanying photo of Kate Page.
Who the hellre you? Do you think youre going to stop me? Me?
Zurrn put his hands together, steepled his fingers, touched them to his lips, his nostrils flaring. Then he shut off his computers, took them with him, got into his van and headed into the night. He drove along a stretch of strip malls, car washes and warehouses, coming to a Burger King with a twenty-four-hour drive-through.
After collecting his order, the aroma of onions and French fries filled the interior. As he threaded his way through a light industrial no-mans land, he took stock of his situation.
Whered he screw up? Hed been careful. Yes, hed made mistakes long ago when he was young, but time had buried them. Hed perfected his technique.
Calm down! So my perfect crime in Rampart was not so perfect. It doesnt matter what police think they know. Ill adjust. They cant touch me because Ill always have the upper hand. Ill always be in control.
He stopped at the gate of JBD 24-7 Mini-Storage. He inserted his card with the chip, then touched his code on the security keypad. The gate opened. He drove slowly through the facilitys neat rows of garage-sized units. It was late, the grounds were deserted. When he found Number 84, he carefully backed the rear of his vehicle to the door, blocking the security cameras from clearly seeing inside.
He pressed the units password on the keypad, then inserted the key into the lock. Metal grumbled as he lifted the units steel door and switched on the light. It was clean and dry inside.
He closed the door.
In the units center, there was a large rectangle shape covered by a sound-absorbing tarpaulin. He pulled it back, revealing two oblong matching wooden crates, each large enough to hold a coffin. Each crate had a small, hinged inspection door, about the size of a hardcover book. His keys jingled as he unlocked the steel lock and opened the first one.